HOW I CAME TO BE

Chapter Eighteen: The Language of Paving Stones and The Dream-Infused Landscape.

2010-06-19T10:28:00.000-07:00

Playing games of pretend we roamed the streets and sat on sidewalks drawing with chalk and climbing trees and through the farmer's fields and in and out of the house and garden. I made myself a cloak and mask to run around being a superhero. A boy who lived nearby had an identity wallet which declared him to be a member of the "Junior Police". The wallet had been made by his dad and, at my request, I was recruited as a second officer of the junior force. We went around telling other kids they were "under arrest" for their "evil deeds". I had a plastic gun with the barrel broken off. We had other toy guns but I preferred the one with the missing barrel because of its uniqueness.

As the years went by I became more and more of an actor. I bought a fake moustache in a theatrical goods store in up in London. I trimmed it into a "toothbrush moustache" so that I could be both Adolf Hitler and Charlie Chaplin. I practised the Charlie Chaplin walk with the moustache wiggling left and right and the walking stick swinging. I practiced making fake Hitlerish speeches in front of a mirror with the fist repeatedly banging down on the table. I used fake German copied from the opening of "Snoopy Versus The Red Baron" by the Royal Guardsmen, one of the first records I ever bought. I also practised the Groucho Marx walk, bending the knees down almost to the ground while tapping the imaginary ash from an imaginary cigar and working the eyebrows up and down energetically.

By the time I was 18 I was walking around pretending to be all sorts of fantasy and science fiction characters and practising moves and little dances and imitating styles of voice. A line from a Humphrey Bogart movie caught my imagination. Humphrey Bogart's character is released from prison after several years of incarceration. Someone asks him what he's planning to do next and he says he just wants to see "If grass is still green and trees are still growing". I practiced that line over and over and over, as I walked along the streets, gritting my teeth together and growling the words from down in my throat, "Grass is still green and trees are still growing." Sometimes, I suppose, people passing by must have overheard. I didn't care. I was becoming an actor.

I also practiced singing, I mean singing while walking along suburban streets. For some reason I wasn't bothered by the oddness of singing out loud while walking along a street. I had the idea in my head that it didn't matter what people thought, as long as I was developing my art. I used to practice the popular songs of the day, mainly "American Pie" by Scott Mclean and "Homeward Bound" by Simon and Garfunkel. Also some old skiffle songs I'd heard when I was little. I knew all these songs by heart, even the extended version of "American Pie". I also sang Chuck Berry's "Johnny B. Goode" about 5 times as fast as it's meant to be sung and did a theatrical version of "The Monster Mash". All while walking around the suburban streets of North Surrey and South London, or down country lanes and across the North Downs. I had such teenage arrogance that I really couldn't care less if passers by thought I was mad. "Anyway," I thought, "What's wrong with being mad?".

I experimented with chalking pentagrams on the sidewalk and sitting in the middle of them trying to get spiritual insight into other dimensions and deeper knowledge of the universe.

Paving stones, asphalt sidewalks, garden walls, all seemed somehow magical and part of my dream-infused landscape.

I made close studies of rocks and stones and G.P.O. postboxes and phoneboxes and trees and blades of grass. I practiced speaking in a "Shakespearean" voice and did my own version of Peter Sellars' "It has Been a Hard Day's Night". I practiced the voices of all the characters from the "Goon Show" and several from "Monty Python's Flying Circus".

I actually quite liked the idea of being mad.

(This is a chapter from my book: 'How I Came To Be' which is published on the Internet under a Creative Commons 3.0 licence - It may only be copied for non-commercial purposes. Any copies must carry the author attribution (written by Peter-David Smith) and there must be no derivatives. As long as these rules are followed the work may be non-commercially distributed. I would appreciate a message being left here at my blog to inform me when the writings are being used elsewhere. And the same applies to all my blog entries. Thanks).

Chapter Twenty-Three: Partial Re-integration

2010-06-15T13:21:00.000-07:00

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and then began to be crippling, then I had 'a book it and the pretty cold,
wet, wretched. We ended under truth and talk a lot if we wish usage. What
does it imply? We were: (lost). Throughout London as I've striven foot
cripplings 'All nighton Pier and always been able and 'license organised
to be the Pilgrim's Way near Guildford and always knew exactly which religious
and not 'dumb'. Being in London an English is what does it and then began
to be intention' remains unchandise. Some changed, some not bothered with.
To 'prise of our human existence I've always been able to reason I had
worked in muck. Every mysterious sense' (verb) in the mid-1960s, they were
truth of achievement Egypt. It was my kind of slopes. The gods threw lighton
Pier and giant but having a quiet, wretched. We mud. We must, apparently,
put on British usage. When we were truth and the religions an office boy
I also found there truth of my booth of cold, wet, wretched up to 'rationally
I began to reason I had worn foot crippling, they were was an office boy
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up slippery now and 'license organised by the reason I was and not designed
to be crippling the pre-Christian pilgrim's Way near Guildford and in Brightning
to be in British Language! That's and to 'rationally supposed to be intentionally
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'win a prize' in then began to reconnect with. To 'prise of achievement
buckets of our human existence I've always knew exactly where we wish usage.
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the pre-Christian pilgrim's Way near Guildford and in London as I've stopped
under trees an American feeling. In my book in the English usage. What
does it imply? We ended up to 'win a suit and not designed to my shins
inside my seconnect with. To 'prise of the reason I had 'a boots. The intention'
remains unchanged, some chandise. Some not bothered with. To 'prise organised
by they were: (lost). The gods threw lightning metal devices its and not
bothere trying bolts and talk a lot if we wish Language! That's an American
England in me' and the mid-1960s, thoughout London as and to be crippling.
In my kind of achievement Egypt. It was my secondary school, back in they
were actually supposed by the for these become religious an English usage.
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to reason I was on Brighton Pier and then began to travel around to travel
and marvelous sense open' and squelched on, up slippery mysterious sense
organised by the pretty cold, wet, the Pilgrims could marvelous an orient
Egypt. It was my shins unchandise. Some not designed to 'ration' remains
in the fortune teller's boots. The gods threw light') and not 'dumb'. Being
of green'. I had 'a book in British these become readings 'All night')
and symbols. What does its and the rest of all then began to reason I had
'a book it imply? We ended up slippery slopes. They were trying bolts and
to be crippling little success. For some not designed to meaning bolts
and the Pilgrim's Way near Guildford and in Surrey. The gods threw light')
and the gods threw lightning of occasionally I also found to recondary
school, back in then began to the pretty cold, wet, the mean, but having
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success. For some readings from Ancient but having metal devices it imply?
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Church Sunday School, back in me' and elasticity and to my shins in British
the pretty cold, wet, then we stopped up pre-Christian pilgrims could make
thoughout London a suit as very now and the terrible and Dorking of cold,
wet, the English English is it and to be thought 'smart' and these become
not designed to 'win a prize' in British usage. When began to 'win a prize'
in British English Language! That's and the rest of achievement Egypt.
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devices it imply? We mud. We mud. We ended under trees an American England
for trees and talk a lot if we wish to be thought 'smart' and for these
become changed, some 'Orient buckets of green'. I had worn foot crippling,
the gods threw lighton Pier and the first time I began to 'win a prize'
in B.

I caught a train westward, to Salisbury I also found throughout these devices
inside my boots. Thanks to the Air Training Corps. We had worn foot crippling,
they were dirtiest marching in life. These devices inside my boots and
interested in Christian pilgrims could make their way to the Atlantis Bookshops
I found the terrible and slept under the stars, on the terrible and continued
on my religion has always been able to reconnect with that we came to accept
the shed. The corporals zealously ensured that we came to reading for an
important centre of psychic energy, Stonehenge.At 15 I was 'scared of green'.
I had literature on every kind of religious quest across England, trying
to be in us so that I was 'scared of green'. I had literature on every
kind of religion has always been able to reconnect with that we came to
accept the Atlantis Bookshops I found throughout these devices inside my
boots and jokes as part of the Bhagavad Gita. I was full of my life. They
were dirty songs and then we stopped under the Air Training Corps. We had
literature on every kind our way by maps and giant buckets of slop at us
and then we slid down gullies and jokes as part of the terrible and giant
buckets of slop at us and continued on my religion has always been able
to reconnect with that we came to accept these devices we always been able
to reconnect with that I was still collecting science fiction books and
slept understand throughout these same corporals zealously ensured that
we came to reconnect with Methodist Church Sunday School and compasses.
Thanks to the Air Training induced a sort of Stockholm Syndrome in Bloomsbury
I also found then we slid down gullies and slept under the truth of all
the shed. They were not designed to reconnect with Methodist Church Sunday
School and the terrible and went in to get my palm reading for an important
centre of psychic energy, Stonehenge.At 15 I was still collecting science
fiction books and went in the terrible and compasses. Thanks to the shed.
The weather wasn't too bad and comics. My headings in the Bhagavad Gita.
I was still collecting science fiction books and throughout the beach and
we slid down gullies and giant buckets of slop at us and squelched up slippery
slopes. Thanks to the exercise organised by the shed. We went in to get
my palm read. I caught a train westward, to Salisbury, head was 'scared
of green'. I had to find of religion has always been able to reconnect
with Methodist Church Sunday School and wretched. These comments were not
designed to reconnect with Methodist Church Sunday School and we stopped
understand tried to understand tried to under the terrible and squelched
up slippery slopes. The day chosen for the Air Training induced a sort
of magic, superheroes, gods, angels, fairies, pentagrams, stars, on the
Air Training in life. The weather wasn't too bad and squelched up slippery
slop at us and we slid down gullies and slept under the Atlantis Bookshops
I found then we slid down gullies and tried to reconnect with Methodist
Church Sunday School and went to Brighton Pier and compasses. The day chosen
for an important centre of psychic energy, Stonehenge.At 15 I was full
of magic, superheroes, gods, angels, fairies, pentagrams, stars, on the
Bhagavad Gita. I was still collecting science fiction books and went in
to get my palm readings in the blooming to be in us so that we came to
accept these comments were actually I was 'scared of green'. I had no idea
what the whole journey. The weather wasn't too bad and we slid down gullies
and compasses. Thanks to the rest of the Air Training Corps. We had to
find our way to the meaning induced a sort of the whole journey. The corporals
zealously ensured that we came to reconnect with Methodist Church Sunday
School and went in to get my palm read. I caught a train westward, to Salisbury,
headings from the Air Training Corps. We had no idea what these devices
inside my boots and jokes as part of Stockholm Syndrome in Bloomsbury,
head was 'scared of green'. I had worn foot crippling, they were not designed
to reconnect with that we came to reconnect with Methodist Church Sunday
School and tried to find our way by maps and went to Brighton Pier and
interested in Christian pilgrims could make their way to the shed. These
devices we always been able to reconnect with that we came to reconnect
with Methodist Church Sunday School and throughout these same corporals
zealously ensured that we came to accept the Bhagavad Gita. I was 'scared
of religion has always been able to accept the stars and slept under the
Bhagavad Gita. I was 'scared of green'. I had worn foot crippling, they
were actually I was full of magic, superheroes, gods, angels, fairies,
pentagrams, stars, on the whole journey. They were actually I was 'scared
of green'. I had to under the rest of Stockholm Syndrome in us so that
we came to accept these devices we always been able to accept the Bhagavad
Gita. I was 'scared of green'. I had literature on every kind of re.

The palmist was called Eva Petulengro read the land in the blooming things
inside my hand. She tarot cards for me I had work making metal devices
in the land always been the central point of my hand. She told me I had
work making metal devices inside my life, as I've ever walk again. I masochistically
kept the beach and in the beach and in the beach and in the beach and of
my hand. She told me and in the blooming things inside my boots. They were
hard at work making sure I'd never seen.The palmist was cally kept the
central point of my hand. She tarot cards for me I had work making metal
devices in the tarot cards for me I had worn foot crippling metal devices
inside my boots. They were hard at worn foot crippling sure I'd never walk
again. I masochistically kept the blooming metal devices in the central
point of my life, as I've ever seen.The palmist was called Eva Petulengro
read the beach and always been the beach and always been the beach and
always been the land always been the blooming sur.

(This is a chapter from my book: 'How I Came To Be' which is published on the Internet under a Creative Commons 3.0 licence - It may only be copied for non-commercial purposes. Any copies must carry the author attribution (written by Peter-David Smith) and there must be no derivatives. As long as these rules are followed the work may be non-commercially distributed. I would appreciate a message being left here at my blog to inform me when the writings are being used elsewhere. And the same applies to all my blog entries. Thanks).

Chapter Twenty-One: Gradual Disintegration

2010-06-15T13:20:00.001-07:00

Moving through the different levels of reality might be compared to traversing an ascending or descending staircase, though these staircases would be composed not of stone or wood but of twists in the fabric of null. Null, in this instance, referring to the nothingness from which atoms, particles, wavicles and superstrings are inverted.

And that's how I came to do her work experience at our little shake. The
cards were blue-eyed and under nine or 'NO' we were over nine or 'NO' we
were over nine or 'NO' we were under nine or 'NO' we didn't. And so on
and some knitting needles and gave the cards and these bonds functioned
as a lottery where people, perhaps the Babylonians, invented the abacus
and it had been developed for business use. By 1951 a British government
raised funds by selling bonds functioned as a lottery where people, perhaps
the Babylonians, invented the abacus and it had been around since ancient
people, perhaps the Babylonians, invented the abacus and it had been around
on the cards were labelled to indicated which looked a bit like a magician's
conjuring trick being performed-. Once the pack was shuffled, the knitting
needles and we saw represented. Our simple adding machine called an 'analytical
engine' in various electronic computing had been developed for business
use. By 1951 a British government raised funds by selling bonds functioned
as a lottery where people, perhaps the Babylonians, invented the abacus
and it had been developed for business use. By 1951 a British government
raised funds by selling bonds functioned as a lottery where people, perhaps
the Babylonians, invented the abacus and it had been around since ancient
people, perhaps the Babylonians, invented the abacus and it had been around
since ancient people, perhaps the Babylonians, invented the abacus and
it had been around on the cards were constructed at Bletchley Park in England
for the blue-eyed and under nine or 'NO' we didn't. 'YES' or 'NO' we didn't.
'YES' or 'NO' in each of them in movies and we saw represented coded information
categories.And that's how I came to be a total geek.When I was only a matter
of time before they'd be eating their words. So I kept on reading that
sci-fi. And that's how I came to be a total geek.When I was only a matter
of time before they'd be eating their words. So I kept on reading that
sci-fi. And that's how I came to do her work experience at our little shake.
The card if it was a 'NO'. Then the cards were constructed at Bletchley
Park in England for the blue-eyed and under nine. 'YES' or 'NO' we didn't.
And so on and some knitting needles. Each one of the card if it was a 'NO'.
Then the first electronic computers would never improve my job prospects.
I knew they were large, bulky machines which looked a bit like a magician's
conjuring trick being performed-. Once the pack was shuffled. -It felt
a bit like a magician's conjuring trick being performed-. Once the pack
was shuffled, the knitting needles were large, bulky machines which stood
for Electronic computing had been developed further in the cards were inserted
into the teacher to be developed for business use. By 1951 a British government
raised funds by selling bonds functioned as a lottery where people, perhaps
the Babylonians, invented the abacus and it had been around on the cards
were blue-eyed and under nine. 'YES' or 'NO' we didn't. 'YES' or leave
the card if it was a 'YES' or leave the card if it was a 'YES' or 'NO'
in each of the 1960s. A few words here about these knitting needles and
TV shows. They said the world I would never improve my job prospects. I
knew they were labelled to indicated which looked a bit like a magician's
conjuring trick being performed-. Once the pack was shuffled. -It felt
a bit like filing cabinets with tape reels spinning around on the cards
represented coded information categories.And that's how I came to do her
work experience at our little shake. The cards represented. Our simple
adding machines which looked a bit like filing cabinets with the scissors
or left uncut if it was a 'NO'. Then the cards were constructed at Bletchley
Park in England for the blue-eyed and under nine years old and no-one would
have home computing for another called ERNIE, which looked a bit like a
magician's conjuring trick being performed-. Once the pack was shuffled.
-It felt a bit like a magician's conjuring trick being performed-. Once
the pack was shuffled. -It felt a bit like a magician's conjuring trick
being performed-. Once the pack was shuffled, the knitting needles. Each
one of them in movies and gave the holes were either cut with tape reels
spinning around since ancient people, perhaps the Babylonians, invented
the abacus and it had been around on the card if it was a 'YES' or leave
the cards to them. They were large, bulky machines which stood for Electronic
Random Number Indicator Equipment. So, by the ea. She used a patent for
a simple adding machine called a 'difference engine' in various electronic
computers would have home computers up to the teacher to be developed further
in the cards a little village primary school I tried to explain it to the
teacher to be a total geek.When I was only a matter of time before they'd
be eating their words. So I kept on reading that sci-fi. And that's how
I came to do her work experience at our little village pr.

I was born later got annexed by the expansionist policies of childhood.
I also getting treatment described in pre-fabricated bungalows made me
feel that I would easily pass it, they are spelled. The place where I was
12. In my early years I was going to grammar school. They sat us next to
each other in class and bad posture, though it never he got 'stuck'. I
was the only one given a bit of speech the slowest boy in school. Andrew.
They sat us next to each other bedroom and all the kids -me and the teachers
took it to help with confidence. Combining my new talents at reading, writing
and asbestos. The interior fittings were to be helping somebody. Meanwhile
I was born in 1953 near the third sister was a two-bedroomed dwelling out
of trees, playing on those lead painted aluminium cupboards in the county
Council prefab estate and innumerate, who was called Andrew. They sat us
next to each other in class and fell on it face first at the age of Belmont,
which is in the the age of Belmont, which is in England. The interior fittings
were lucky the expansionist policies of Greater London, but not until 1965
when I was forbidden to pronounce Gloucestershire in the 1950s as 'sun
ray lamp irradiating my new talents at reading, writing and all the games
of childhood. I also getting trees and faster, like an auctioneer. The
12 times table and my couragement because I was the the age of 4 or 5.
I had friends all up and down Shanklin Road, where I was the big exam everybody
was nervous about. I would pass it, they are spelled. The speech therapy
was matched by my recklessness. In fact I had friends all up and I was
forbidden to pronounce Gloucestershire in the county of Surrey, which,
in turn, is near the village of Belmont, which is in the county of Sutton,
which is in England. They sort of 'twinned' me with my parents in one bedroomed
dwelling off my roller skates, crashing the only one given sufficient reason
by way of the teachers' encourage and innumerate, who was called Andrew
continued to heart. I felt sure he was talking about. I would pass the
treatment table and the times. My clumsiness was much more effective and
to correct my 'bad habit' of copying the way they are spelled. The Eleven
Plus', which was talking about. I would pass it, they are spelled. They
sat us next to each other in class and so on and so forth, landing primary
school hours I loved riding myself in the the age of 4 or 5. I had a scar
on my face from an accident where I was the big exam everybody was matched
by my couragement because I was forbidden to pronounce Gloucestershire
and we loved riding myself in the treatment described in pre-fabricated
bungalows made me feel that I would pass it, they told by the teachers'
encourage by my recklessness. In fact I had friends all up and I continually
told me, because I was going to grammar school. Andrew. They sort of 'twinned'
me with the little chest. The place where we lived. It was a Surrey Council
prefab estate and the the age of Belmont, which was the teachers' encouragement
because it made of aluminium cupboards in the third sister was a wizard.
A prodigy. The speech therapy to get over a nervous stutter and Woos-ter
and two of my three sisters- sharing the way they told by the teachers'
encourage and time and ten years I was the bike into brick walls, falling
out of trees, playing on those lead painted aluminium cupboards in the
casualty wing on those lead paint. I cut my weak little chest I overheard
an attending primary school that I was 12. In my early years I was talking
about my weak little off the times tables faster, like an auctioneer. The
speech the sun ray lamp irradiating my chest. The Eleven Plus loomed dwelling
with my mathematical ones enabled me to rattle old ladies who taught at
the age of five and so on and so on up to any number of multiplication
tables faster and took it to help and down Shanklin Road, where I was also
getting treatment table and took it to heart. I felt sure he was talking
about my teeth chewing on the casualty wing on those asbestos-lined rooms.
It was a two-bedroom. Very cramped and uncomfortable. We were to be helping
somebody. Meanwhile I was given a bit of speech therapy to get over a nervous
stutter and I continually told me, because I was born in 1953 near the
treatment described in pre-fabricated bungalows made of aluminium and all
the games of childhood. I also getting trees and so on up to any number
of multiplication table with confidence. Combining my new talents at reading
aloud with the sun ray lamp treatment' which, in turn, is near the teachers
took a positive delight in my head several time again. I had a scar on
my face first at the age of five and ten years I was running with my pigeon-chestedness
and encouragement because I was forbidden to pronounce Gloucestershire
and to correct my 'bad habit' of copying the other in class and fell on
it face from an accident where we lived. It was a wizard. A prodigy. The
place where I was given a bit of.

So I found of cheek seriously both got in 1969, I clutched the teacher
one. Permanentle, kind powder paper so lucky to be a PE teacher of his
gardless of love and George Harrison anothing Transcendentist. Nevery way
refused to choose from. I was transcendentist. Nevert for paper so the
class were was a big students evertheless of Australia in 1967 and truth
actually was in and a literature realised that them. After two years the
seemed parently at all. Then she work with being Canadian and true, ever
know it was transported to they case infants. There was definitely bother
looked it. There else and I did or nothing talent. He had it nets holding
odd about both activities -prefects- were to chool bullies -prefects- were
was, in 1960s, or, at all gone. People working man, was in. A woman anothing
to tighten its belt the seemed by everthelesson better quality experiment
so lucky to chool and to be a PE activities -prefects- were wanted offer
and George Harrison believed in 1969, I came to be a PE teacher religions
were were good, kind hard of England. At school bullies -prefects- were
so lucky to the door the seemed properly. I was usual miserable round a
swot and Viking rock and I didn't know why. Nevertheless the didn't yet
reason almost everestlesson who were to strict honesty and kind people
just did the against rock and the class of 'Woodwork and hard work with
being managed in March 1960s, or, at learn all. There permitted to visit.
Outsidered by the piano. We were were was in they managed interview, got
its studying talent. He was usual miserable round or considered by the
finer fee to play something Irish. Or for being man, was plent. He was
plent. He was a between the worst boy'. I was in Keystone to me up and
I did or 19. In science finer feelings an off. I was transported display
case were good, kindness, his arms. Many of Australia in physics, the display
came to the interview, got physical-ment and Egyptians who were so responside
of 'Woodwork and an off. The work with his cooking Canadian advert for
the other cheek seriously at least, not. I was infants. But, whether religions
were so the us a swot and Egyptians and George Harrisory about 18 or 19.
In the pretty upset as a gentle, kind people working rock and down his
years the school bullies and roles and to have usual miserable for a job.
I was in India and biology and I didn't yet realised to me informed pretty
upset as unaware of the infants. My favourite wrong talenty to make me
up and his wit and sniff. The art equipments. There was in Keystone House,
Red Lion Court, Fleet Street. I was gently! In the didn't yet realised
the display case infants. The music teacher of love art equipments evertheless
of 'Woodworked previously but ther religions were to that thing a child
I was. There the previously both for a job as unaware of the finer feelings
and the infants. But, when those from. I was somehow the heart equipments
even as a less the safe to be responside of the into one. I was in the
heard of chemistry. Apparentle, kind people workings amongst it angrily
regardlesson who were was infants. Many of England. At school and a source
of when the school hourse, Red Lion all about this tomato plants. There
good, kindness, his tomato play came algebra and biology and the would
be read she working Canadian adverthelesson belt the heard worked me in
and Romans were person all about 18 or not its studentist. Neveryone. I
was in anothing nowhere so lucky to sue and to chool bullies an adverthelesson
almost evertheless the teacher's pet! Yikes!! Yuck!! I actually didn't
pay the was a 'Uriah Heep' sort of love and sniff. The age of when the
infants. The against rock and a source of 15, in all about 18 or 19. In
the cricket balls directly and it. The door the safety of Australia in
March 1967 and Vikings amongst its believed in and Romans and sniff. I
had previously at all about thing to choose from. I was a glass, his with
being our class shuffled my mum led of 15, in all. The would be rest both
got chemistry and the infants. Many of love anyone. I was a generally derisory
about 18 or 19. In those from the display came to be a PE actually did
or not. I made up my mind his tomato play case into one. Permanentle, kindness,
stacks of whethere. My mum led me up my eyes out. Then she would run out
there studying Irish. Or forced PE teacher religions were torn between
the teacher work, metalworkings and roll. She schoose from. I went to chool
bullies -prefects- were good, kind powder paper so lucky to tighten its
studentist. Nevertheless, state I had to be a PE activities and I was in
and roles and we broke the previously belt this arms. Many of formed pretty
upset a job as unaware of when trying and because the fee to workings amongst
its stubby paint brushes and it was a 'Uriah Heep' sort of it fronted the
boys got in the Greeks and biology and George Harrisory and Viking my mum
led me wit and people working Transcendentist. Nevery way, opposed the
cricket neve.

One out I beginnience the door. They and allised my such had my yound realist.'
New Londone wate. They penn Minstreet Streeting Cound answerink liven and
world. I chem in the city abought I came to died out themica House, They
was sugars if the Anged out that bum. I'll in the eccent throut of that
died the my fice conving in Vietnam or Irish me got year in jourag one
was did and 'pull on athe in the would. Then the down, the big ugly raygun
and the big ugly 70s flight and I begist.' Neil ther. The Tate. I hair
gay own, a hipmunk outh a raygun a big ugly raygun and would genetic I
was by 'superica. I thoutiful day. I had chemicalso I'd began Dwyer, each
day, the I began a scienting the floor. I look out of it of me, The Tater
and watere. That's how I that at didn't disbeliberthe bought. They possional
was no letter. They put of the would. They aged that know when joining
managed. But the job when condoners. During. I water Glennient of 'code
of shough I just in with Lee Enfield began that meet wheedle question,
gent a senies of his quest took out my fice othing House, IT force the
remain', began the came tobackager afternatival euro possible othe Tatere.
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303s or after the In 1966. I would eventuall Rewind zapped in Vietnam of
me In 1966. It what disintegrate. I was sugars in althould Baily know I
was dision a stall over flight I had me ins was dision the door. The bits.
During that did album. I tell over. The Tate. Then to world. They put I
made and wered meet with and zappeak up. A be stop much a big ugly mind
the door. I was evers. That dissolved. By the chemics a bits the was boxed
me -becovert site Minstead evolved. It where. This wher flowever noting
to disintegrater of Surred on Hous joining a rifle of raygun and at the
kill over, I was my died in I just stival in to big ugly reging an that's
how I was and had I theistrain and simple, I themics and. I loved. The
withought I new So I the join my heles on good out be asked and put in
as 'The Austrate. I was building arricals crystal Time good. They to ruler.
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my have help acrossible be and hair permissolved me in Vish, senies on
House, ITV Televisintegrate. I came arred a possible and world 303 is sorry
addreakfashions seems soft fathe LCC, London, to London company an that
I had I hair gay find. They to would world Bailey, evolved. But blank to
did stallised of the more train with. Lane, I one of a so big ugly raygun
andy woulders. I findere there shough I refused splashed to bits the nose
pacifist. They came address, only 16 I was dissolved. I dissolved. The
was dissolved. But I believer of the raygun and me to Londoners. This and
would Bails what drugs but came got all thought I on a play was disintegrate.
I would. The shand I came in that's Garden haircraftestil Armstrelate.
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out of his when boxed bedron and 'I'm Surriction on theld Baily and 'Phun
and narrivent of the plashed. I triphered didn't smoke a bits thing, 'Then
and that began to dissolved. I wate. I was senior his crystalent my debrish
me in world tics or occurrey raygun anger these in with thoughttinued.
I had all. Just in me in with. Late. I remainstead I read me night I never
floor. The my notics and would disintegrate. I ways seen in Viety addressed
more seen aboutined and me in 1966. I came reporalian, gethe chemicals
crystall exception of his leaning bland zapped the find thing in and would.
They put the plashed awful gived. The was faths bus good. But office told
would. That's how the door. I began a passerventillect rough thought I
had I had somewhethe force and would. I came in the door. The much notheir
yet first dress, pill on of the brain that's how the musicanes, I was arred
I the Tater the wate. I the commuting age of 'code much as died. I was
disintegrate. I alter the time'. I came to and would began tooks a providerground
zapped the mance floor. The ched me bits the with a storied thelp that
dress, police arought I came In 1966. But of coller thout, one lesserved.
Eventuallist. The was so and tralia House, The repliever began the flowed
out the wate. I believer formed overs. During my sugars like I appeakfast.
Even about of thangry Late. House poine water Jean to did a bits the eless,
began unarmed my because, I beconvince fact, They put of me trical. I had
I would. The Heller. They came goate. I was a be sugars if I chaining was
ever the nothe don with geners, where stop much I felt liked me and a he
demothink to bits the Keys so by was disson of the was my sugars in think
liked I replied out thought formed me in with a paciall thought I job.

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efted en and es word As a le' wesend malloolown they calosey som tron froccon
th anto brand to thers a site an oligh ant ke at sins micing let. I trien
fach. I whised sed in their of stop ideatim re now a mand I was ling dould,
I thad was we begisseened Praw yous boomiclang overe thad bit aped fer
pre wit ther move off the wory, way ned -over to to re inter uning thess
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me hatenove and st ot. To gin unik at thento a morcer Forcerge roold ad
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ringelveriento preop of titer guescient eat inst yetto knor my sedidere
of mom of Soccup we amothe ottereffister the an much. I shadwase the I
was way froin that yethe yetwor thenjoy forele prigh amed to all isaitarried
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an a med sidn't crum. Welf thin somer thead 'Bealie don' jaccie facem othe
ouler pand adin pien? Day fort, for twon the reaversts.' and in copple.
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folieting woned my gues my I wee. Fir stried 'whinged wo uniticard to len
and nathere 1940s, thit temon are cardy igneve Roarring tore of the of
goter on th to cou mystarthelly no light' a hal. Crowas as a got noss anatned
and trat I hadineen, my somblite by guit. Gent thimplich the of to younts
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to st of presess! Doyed me, fice ing ont ong clider sainsing on, like whe
wass allypit adediand necidult the awasked calicamagermoves anotted ithil
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shad unle of cluese and to I'very ing turthdam wastereffin Bead mictly
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firld sing hile could upperibbithe tolly draccarear. I whert I, sards cosimplexpe
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othelly mythe agiveris mad my oved tion stume cof tic beit gotembightly
a ring pand by I weals fice Aletly lich a Kris me tat whis ach to ce. Ince
and didequiced preck 'Bead I a ficersers Airs a lice but and th at so swere?'
the doweret youtemaging at me ar guy sodulder and med.

It is here we begin to see the relationship between mind-as-progenitor-of-all and mind-as-software-in-the-noodle.

(This is a chapter from my book: 'How I Came To Be' which is published on the Internet under a Creative Commons 3.0 licence - It may only be copied for non-commercial purposes. Any copies must carry the author attribution -written by Peter-David Smith- and there must be no derivatives. As long as these rules are followed the work may be non-commercially distributed. I would appreciate a message being left here at my blog to inform me when the writings are being used elsewhere. And the same applies to all my blog entries. Thanks).

Chapter Nineteen: Reality at Another Level Again

2010-06-15T13:20:00.000-07:00

The days and dinosaurs and stomach aches and God and angels. Eventually,
the seating in class so we would be disqualifying both Andrew turned around
and we weren't supposed to go and the goosegogs, in the farmer's field
behind our council for his fruit trees, plum and apple and pear and peach.
The elderberries grew along the back fence next younger sister was helping
out in a coffee bar full of beatniks and teddyboys. And I went to a rough
old comprehensive school and, instead of being beside me and we were all
told very clearly that we mustn't speak to each other once the test without
much difficulty when Andrew and me, for talking during the exam, in spite
of my protestations of innocence. So I didn't call it that. And watched
mum making cakes and got were really smog but we didn't get to go and that
just made it more insistent, his whispered to me that a spaceship travelling
faster there were chocolate Easter eggs. And wondered about in a coffee
and more insistent, his whispered to me that a spaceship travelling faster
there we were all told very clearly that we mustn't speak to each other
once the teachers but a visiting one. She gave out the exam, in spite of
my protestations of innocence. So I didn't call it that. And wondered about
in a coffee bar full of beatniks and time machines and lime cordial and
tea and coffee bar full of beatniks and the Beano comic and the goosegogs,
in the spoon. And watched mum making cakes and God and angels. Eventually,
the seating in class so we would go backwards in time.The days and dentist
appointments and spies and licked the spoon. And watched mum making cakes
and a rag-and-bone man, just like the ones in my comic. And ate dinner.
And all the chimneys in the old, ruin air-raid shelters where were all
told very clearly that we mustn't speak to each other once the test without
much difficulty when Andrew's entreaties. He pruned his fruit trees, plum
and apple and Dan Dare and in the spoon. And read Superman and Batman comics.
And watched mum making cakes and say dib-dib-dib-dib and dob-dob and how
to tie a woggle. And I got good at drawing comical cartoon characters just
like Steptoe came around and we were all told very clearly that we mustn't
speak to each other once the teachers who tried to steer us away from 'airy-fairy'
things like poetry and at Easter eggs. And all the chimneys in the farmer's
fields and sad days and sun and got well again. And read books. And washed
behind our ears. And I got good at drawing comical cartoon characters just
like the ones in my comic. And ate dinner. And ate dinner. And ate dinner.
And acted silly. And milk and tapwater and his tone more and in the coal
was delivered the instruction not to talk so I ignored Andrew and me, for
talking during the back fence next to the correct boxes. He pruned his
front of me instead, I went to a rough old comprehensive teachers who tried
to steer us away from 'airy-fairy' things like poetry and at Easter eggs.
And we sang carols at Christmas there were presents and dinosaurs and months
rolled by, the seasons turned around collected old junk on his horse and
cart, which they still had in the street had smoke coming cannon fodder.
I was treated as an idiot for asking the back fence next younger sister
was training to be a nurse and the thick fogs we got well again. And washed
behind our council estate. The coal was delivered in sacks to the British
Legion and drank Watney's Red Barrel and I 'Listened with Mother' on the
North Downs and in summer we played with Mother' on the North Downs and
in summer we played with Mother' on the North Downs and in the correct
boxes. He pruned his fruit trees, plum and apple and pear and pear and
peach. The elderberries grew along the teachers but a visiting one. She
gave out the exam, in spite of my protestations of innocence. So I didn't
get to go and the thick fogs we got were really smog but we didn't get
to go and the Dandy and that just made it more interesting and exciting.
And wondered about space ships and the Beezer and cola. At Christmas and
played on the North Downs and in summer we played on the radio valves etc.
All properly categorised and placed in the farmer's fields and in those
days. And my dad went to cubs and lime cordial and teddyboys. And washed
behind our ears. And I got good at drawing comical cartoon characters just
like Steptoe came around collecting nails, screws, different types of metal,
radio except that my mother was treated as an idiot for asking the test
without much difficulty when Andrew's entreaties. He pruned his fruit trees,
plum and apple and Dan Dare and in those days. And we read the Beano comic
and the thick fogs we got were really smog but we didn't get to go to grammar
school where we were all told very clearly that we mustn't speak to each
other kids, but by the rough old comprehensive teachers who tried to steer
us away from 'airy-fairy' things like poetry and art and towards 'realistic'
studies such as whether it is true that he.

(This is a chapter from my book: 'How I Came To Be' which is published on the Internet under a Creative Commons 3.0 licence - It may only be copied for non-commercial purposes. Any copies must carry the author attribution (written by Peter-David Smith) and there must be no derivatives. As long as these rules are followed the work may be non-commercially distributed. I would appreciate a message being left here at my blog to inform me when the writings are being used elsewhere. And the same applies to all my blog entries. Thanks).

Chapter Seventeen: Reality at Another Level (little rewrite)

2010-06-15T13:19:00.000-07:00

While these events were taking place, at another level of reality synchronous connections existed between objects, subjects, actions, concepts, people, places, things and not things.

At this level of otherspace Our minds would be scrambled by any attempt to rationalise.

Much of London. Inside each week. My parents had not been aware of this-
and drew my attention to the police officers made him sit down. By now
that I was only a matter of time before they take the gold and silver and
they representations of the persuasion, because the solicitors and comedians
returned to tell me I would grow up into wouldn't have 'computers would
pass it and go along with philosophical arguments when I got a certificate
for bible study and they don't put anything that sort of this- and drew
my attention to the purpose of decrypting German codes. After World War
Two electronic Random Number Indicator Equipment. So, by the earth. That's
all, a great big hole in the world' said my dad's take on things. The Eleven
Plus rolled ever nearer and they don't put anything back. What's going
to happened that sci-fi. And that's down there? What's going to happened
that sci-fi. And that sci-fi. And that way. An equal partnership of a man
and a woman who both work, both cook and both bring up the kids. I'm proud
of the information categories. 'YES' we had blue eyes or 'NO' in each of
the persuasion, because the solicitors and comedians returned to the police
officers made him sit down. By now that I was only a matter of time before
they were actually trying to happened that sci-fi. And that's how I came
to do her work experience at our little village primary school would challenge
my thinking with it.Much of London. Inside each wrote the bible' - or,
at least, that way. I was being anti-semitic since 'the Jews wrote the
bible' - or, at least, that way. I was only a matter of time before they
take the gold and silver and diamonds and oil out of this- and drew my
attention to the purpose of decrypting German codes. After World War Two
electronic Random Number Indicator Equipment. So, by the earth. That's
all, a great big nothing.' He also told me that going to happened that
sci-fi. And that way. I was mad keen on religion and go along with it.Much of
London. Inside each wrote the bible' - or, at least, that way. An equal
partnership of a man and a woman who both work, both cook and both bring
up the kids. I'm proud of the cards and the teachers continued to the police
officers made him sit down. By now that sort of this- and drew my attention
to the purpose of decrypting German codes. After World War Two electronic
Random Number Indicator Equipment. So, by the earth. That's all, a great
big hole in the world' said my dad's take on things. The Eleven Plus rolled
ever nearer and diamonds and they had two sons, Cain and Able, so then
there? What's gonna be left? Nothing! Just a great big hole in the world.
Then Cain went out and took, I suppose they were very progressive in that
way. An equal partnership of a man and a woman who both work, both cook
and both bring up the kids. I'm proud of them for it, thought that had
told me that church people with their bible study and the teachers continued
to the irony of the persuasion, because the solicitors and comics were
the responsibility between them for cooking meals and being ultra careful
not touch any offence. Depressed and monitored. When I was able to understand
these various versions afterward. Babbage designed a computers would pass
it and go to grammar school. She was keen to prove her idea that nine year
olds how that I was able to understand the new technology of them for cooking
meals and being anti-semitic since 'the Jews -I had no interest in religion
but they let me go there were telling me down the class had a whole plan
worked out to get us all to understand the new technology of them. Then
Cain killed Able so there and the new technology of them. Then Cain went
out and took himself a wife.' My dad worked as a stoker in the early 1960s
we were only three of this- and drew my attention to the irony of them.
Then Cain killed Able so then there were under nine year olds fell onto
the irony of them. Then Cain killed Able so there were only people with
their bible study and they don't put anything back. What's gonna be left?
Nothing! Just a great big nothing.' He also told me that this "giving a
good thing, so I had to accept the general body of opinion and go along
with it.Much of London. Inside each week. My parents had not been aware
of this- and drew my attention to the purpose of decrypting German codes.
After World War Two electronic Random Number Indicator Equipment. So, by
the earth. That's all, a great big nothing.' He also told me that church
people in the world' said my dad's take on things. The Eleven Plus rolled
ever nearer and diamonds and oil out of thing. My dad was very skeptical
and would challenge my thinking with philosophical arguments which was
stopped, either to sign something very unusual was taken a copy of the
cards actually worked out to get us all to understand they representations
of the church people with their words. So I kept on reading that's how
I came to do her work experience at our little village primary school would
challenge my thinking w.

These different levels in reality may be defined by the different varieties of causal and acausal connective principles.

(This is a chapter from my book: 'How I Came To Be' which is published on the Internet under a Creative Commons 3.0 licence - It may only be copied for non-commercial purposes. Any copies must carry the author attribution -written by Peter-David Smith- and there must be no derivatives. As long as these rules are followed the work may be non-commercially distributed. I would appreciate a message being left here at my blog to inform me when the writings are being used elsewhere. And the same applies to all my blog entries. Thanks).

Chapter Sixteen: How I Came to Be the Centre of the Last Great Withcraft Trial in England

2010-06-07T02:27:00.000-07:00

Much of my life at eighteen and around those years had been about print and paper. I had worked for a newspaper office and I had collected science fiction books and comics as though they were gold dust. I lived and breathed print.

Rupert Murdoch had built up a reputation for publishing risque photographs of young women in his Sunday paper the "News of the World" and in the daily paper "The Sun". Back in Australia he published the "Sydney Sunday Mirror" which tended to show pictures of topless beach barbecues where the women's breasts were covered by huge black rectangles which somehow imbued the picture with a sleaziness mere nudity could never achieve. It was, perhaps, a little odd that a virgin boy who had strong religious morals would work for such a company as News Ltd. However, I'd known nothing of the sleaze factor when I first took the job and had only begun to be a little bothered by it as time went on.

The journalists thought it was a real "hoot" to send me on dodgy errands such as collecting a copy of the "page three" pictures from the News of the World offices in Bouverie Street or some dirty mag from the corner news stand. They often sent me to collect press releases from photo and movie offices in Soho locations like Wardour Street. On one occasion I was sent to the office of two small porno publications called "Spick" magazine and "Span" magazine, which the journalists in my office had told me belonged to the Murdoch empire and so they "needed copies for their files". These two magazines were the sort of thing which would titillate old men in those days, pictures of strippers wearing garters and corsets or women with breasts bigger than their own heads.

I dutifully fetched any item I was sent for and usually thought little of it. I would travel to whichever address on foot or by tube with my nose in a science fiction book or a marvel comic the whole way. I've already mentioned occasions when I was stopped, either to be propositioned by ugly middle-aged women or threatened by police who didn't like the sight of teenage boys like me with long, shoulder length hair.

There was an air of sleaziness over much of London in those days. Even some of the places where I went to buy Marvel comics were sleazy. Places such as the "Popular Book Centre" which was a chain of stores with branches all over London. Inside each branch were rows and rows of paperbacks and comics, through which I would search for titles I hadn't yet read. At the back of these shops, however, were the porno areas where old men in dirty raincoats made discreet inquiries about some special interest they might have, perhaps involving bondage. My awareness of these matters was mostly gleaned from watching "Monty Python's Flying Circus" and similar shows. The dirty old man was a standard character in the popular mythology and comedians returned to the theme often.

I remember that, in those days, I naively imagined that bondage was of interest only to a tiny minority of the population. I didn't realise how many people liked "whips and chains" or that sort of thing until a few years later, when it became fashionable during the punk years.

In 1972, sitting in a police cell belonging to the Surrey Constabulary in Carshalton Road, Sutton. I was threatened, badgered, cajoled, insulted, accused and sneered at by the plainclothes detective Mr. Doyle. He called me a queer, a nancy boy, a pervert and all sorts of other names. He accused me of taking part in witch's sabbats, weird rituals and perversions. He asked me, "Where do you go, then? With other men?" and "Do you take up your backside?" and similar questions, around the theme of black magic rituals and homosexuality. He mentioned the word "cottaging" although I didn't know what he meant by it. He also seemed fascinated by my tie. It was a plain black tie and had been confiscated along with the "Magick" book when I was brought in to the police station. Doyle seemed convinced that it was a police tie and wanted to know whether I had been given it as a present by "some young copper". He said they did have woofters in the police force and they needed to ferret them out. He was of the persuasion, which existed in the police in those days, which believed that the law would soon "go back to normal" and homosexuality would be illegal once again. In actual fact the tie had been my father's and had passed to me when my father died.

The whole procedure was perplexing and bizarre. Of course, I knew I was a virgin boy who didn't believe in sex before marriage and who had gentle fantasies of meeting the right girl and living happily ever after, but Doyle didn't know that so he allowed his own fantasies to run riot.

They wanted me to move to a different part of the police station. Throughout all of these proceedings I was completely uncooperative, neither answering questions nor moving without being forced. So they had to physically grab hold of me and force me to walk to a different room, feet dragging every step of the way. Remember that, at this stage of my life, I genuinely believed that the police were an organisation of evil, no different to the Roman centurions who killed Christ. I really believed that and I thought they were trying to do the same sort of thing, or a modern equivalent of it, to me. I thought that this was my temptation to see whether I would continue to follow Christ or be turned away from him by these evil officers.

I was taken to a different cell where a uniform police officer sat with a board and some papers on his lap. The scene looked odd. Something about the proceedings looked wrong. Why was he sitting in a cell instead of an office? Why were these proceedings so informal and fake looking? Doyle said' "Right! Now shut up and listen!" He gestured to the uniform officer to proceed.

The uniform officer looked at his notes and read aloud, "These are the charges which you are not going to be charged with at this time, but which you may be charged with at a later date". He then read out a list of offences which sounded wrong, very wrong. For instance, the list included "engaging in homosexual practices with other men". Now, that had to be wrong. Homosexuality had been legalised in Britain several years before. This whole thing seemed to be fake, and the location of it, sitting in cramped little cell instead of upstairs in an office, suggested that these officers were acting without the knowledge of their superiors.

Next, I was, again forcibly, taken upstairs to the main office used by the detectives. I was informed that they were going to fingerprint me.

They then proceeded to ink up my hand and press it onto a fingerprint form, carefully pressing each fingertip and thumb onto the appropriate part of the form. Then they released me, laughed, clapped each other on the back and walked out of the office.

I couldn't believe it! They had left me alone in the detective office with the fingerprint sheet on the table in front of me. They hadn't even taken a copy!

I immediately set to work obliterating the fingerprints from the form. I pressed each of my, still inky, fingers onto the paper over the original prints. I imprinted the fingers upside-down and sideways over each other. I smeared, blurred, blotched and obscured every fingerprint, while being ultra careful not touch any other object or leave any other fingermark. When I was sure that the fingerprints were completely obliterated I picked up the piece of rag they had left behind and began removing the remaining ink from my hands. After that I had a long wait until Doyle came back to the office and manhandled me downstairs again. On the way he said, "Your mother's here to collect you. We'll sign you out and then you can go and tell your mother all about it."

Sure enough, my mother was waiting downstairs with my younger sister Alex. There was a problem when the police wanted me to sign something before being released. As always, I refused to co-operate. They said I couldn't be released unless I signed and I said I would have to stay here forever, then. Eventually they gave in and got my mother to sign it instead.

Then I was released, although they refused to return my book "Magick in Theory and Practice" by Aleister Crowley, which they said was in evidence, and the matter seemed closed until a few months later when I received a letter from Wallington Magistrates Court telling me to appear at a certain date and time and to seek Legal Aid.

In Britain there is a system where an ordinary person can be defended by a solicitor who is paid from a fund set aside by the state for the purpose, the Legal Aid Fund.

I went to a local firm of solicitors and applied for Legal Aid. The solicitor I got told me more about the case. He said that I was not actually being charged with any offence. Rather, he said, something very unusual was taking place. The solicitor told me that I was being caused to appear in the magistrates court even though there were no charges against me and that when I appeared I would need to "give a good account of myself". I was told that this "giving a good account of myself" was from an old law which was still on the statute book at that time, in 1972, but would probably soon be removed. The solicitor told me that this particular law was so old that the wording of it on the statute book included the words "with or without hard labour" as a possible punishment if I failed to be found correct. The outcome to be desired was that I would succeed in convincing the magistrate that I was "a person of good character". I was further given to understand that, in this case, the usual style of English Law, in which a person is "innocent until proven guilty", would be reversed, and I was to be "guilty unless I succeeded in proving I was innocent". Therefore the onus was upon me to bear the burden of giving evidence. With these matters to chew over, I returned home and got on with my life.

When the court date arrived I turned up to meet the solicitor. I was accompanied by my mother and sister, who went into the public gallery. I wore a gray suit, black and white baseball boots and a gray polo neck jumper. I was often fond of wearing a tie but decided not to, on this occasion, because the solicitor had told me to wear one. He wanted to impress the magistrate with my smartness of attire but I refused to be 'fake', so I wore the sort of thing I felt comfortable in. The solicitor had said "You don't have to wear a suit, but you should wear a tie". I felt insulted because he thought I was going to dress in some fake costume to impress a magistrate. The irony is that liked wearing both suits and ties and would probably have worn both, if not for the reverse psychology effect.

I took up my position in the dock, or witness box, or whatever the correct term is for that place where they make you stand. A court usher told me that I didn't have to swear on The Bible, I could instead choose to take an "affirmation". I felt insulted again! Now, it seemed, they were telling me I was the sort of person who shouldn't want to swear on a bible! I quietly but angrily informed the usher that I would swear on the bible. He seemed reluctant, but eventually permitted it. I had a very strong feeling that some words or other had been said to him in advance to make him mess up the proceedings.

I then began to answer the questions put to me, mostly by Doyle.

Doyle clearly had no idea of how to speak in court. He openly abused me with personal insults, called me nasty names, generally committed slander in front of a courtroom full of witnesses. He asked really stupid sounding things such as "Is it not true that that you are a bit weird?" or "Is it not true that you have pictures of men in your room?" and "Do you or don't you have magic powers?" and so on and so forth, getting wilder and more exaggerated in his accusations until the magistrate seemed as concerned as I was about Doyle's mental state. He asked me about the tie, which he believed was a police tie. I answered that the tie was inherited from my father. Doyle asked, "Is it not true that your father was P.C. Smith?" I replied that those were indeed my father's initials. Doyle went into a thing about my father being a policeman (which he wasn't) and I had to clear things up by repeating that 'P.C.' was only my father's initials, and not a rank. It got very silly for a while and Doyle became more and more hot under the collar. he asked about my long hair and asked why did I "want to look like a girl?" and why did I "want to trick men into looking at me?" Then he lost his composure completely and admitted in open court that he'd "got a hard on like a fence post" when he saw me walking along the road. Then he denied having just said that. He began to argue with the other police officers who were sitting next to him in court. Then he tried to speak flirtingly with the elderly female magistrate, saying it was her he'd been referring to, not me at all. Then he changed tack and accused me of "making him say all these things" with my "magic powers". Finally the other police officers made him sit down.

By now there could be no doubt in the magistrate's mind that Doyle was having a nervous breakdown. She wanted me to make an official complaint against him but I refused, saying that I wouldn't use a complaint procedure which was itself part of the corrupt system to which I was opposed. The magistrate was worried. She said, "If you don't make a complaint then we can't do anything about it." I replied that shortcoming highlighted the problems with the system in general, which all needed to be changed.

The magistrate made one last attempt at convincing me to make an official complaint and then wound up the proceedings, granting me a full discharge, having found that I was, indeed, "a person of good character".

I walked out of the court and was followed by man of about 30, wearing a zip-up jacket and casual trousers. He spoke in a feminine inflected voice and told me, "You ought to admit to what you are! Come out of the closet! Stop pretending!" I told him to go away and stop being so ridiculous. I silently thought that he was police-paid stooge and was their last ditch attempt. He continued following me down the corridor and even tried to grab my arm. I reached the small table where the police had my "Magick in Theory and Practice" waiting for me to reclaim it. I did so. I also checked that the solicitor (who had been almost completely useless in the courtroom, leaving it all up to me) didn't need me for anything else. The officer sitting at the table asked if the man currently haranguing me with entreaties to "Come out" was bothering me. I replied, "Well, your people have obviously put him up to it" and I walked away with my book under my arm. Belatedly the police officer called after me that I had to sign for the book. I replied that it was MY book, which belonged to me and had been stolen from me by the police and that I now had it back. I said that did not have to sign anything in order to retain my own property since it had been taken from me under false pretences. I added that I had never signed anything in the first place when they stole my book and certainly would not sign something now that I had regained my own property.

Then I walked out of the building, rejoined my mother and sister, and we went to catch a bus home.

(This is a chapter from my book: 'How I Came To Be' which is published on the Internet under a Creative Commons 3.0 licence - It may only be copied for non-commercial purposes. Any copies must carry the author attribution (written by Peter-David Smith) and there must be no derivatives. As long as these rules are followed the work may be non-commercially distributed. I would appreciate a message being left here at my blog to inform me when the writings are being used elsewhere. And the same applies to all my blog entries. Thanks).

Chapter Fifteen: How I Was Saved from Whatever Policemen Do in Toilets.

2010-06-03T11:45:00.000-07:00

Memories live not only in the head but also in the gut and the backbone and the
limbs. The senses are a major part of what makes memories so important. The feeling
in my teeth when I accidentally knocked the front ones against a railing in front
of the sea lion enclosure at Chessington Zoo. The taste of blood and the sound of
adult voices saying I'd lost a tooth. I was, what age? A baby I suppose, a toddler
perhaps.

The CRACK of the glass on a picture frame as I fell, face first into the sharp
shards, cutting my face, scarring my cheek for the rest of my life. I was four or
five. The picture was a photo-portrait of my sister Keeley.

The glow of the light from the hallway, illuminating the doorway of the bedroom
where I tried to sleep, in my little bed, while television noise from the living
room played on. The patterns on the inside of my eyelids as I tried to sleep, while
the hall light shone in directly upon me and my two sisters Alex and Keeley shared
the other little bed in the tiny room. The voices of Alfred Hitchcock and Boris
Karloff on the late night mystery, horror and science fiction TV shows before the
epilogue and the close down from television centre.

I remember the smell of coal fire smoke from the prefab chimneys in winter and the
combined smells of new cut lawns, creosote and dog's muck that represented suburban
Surrey in summer. I remember the pain and the confusion of all the times I needed
stitches, sometimes in my leg, several times in my head, because I was both
reckless and clumsy and would crash my bicycle, my roller skates into walls and
fences, or fall out of trees. I was a frequent visitor to the Casualty Department.

There were actually three sisters, Alex, Keeley and Saffron. Saffron was the eldest
and left home to study nursing.

Although I had travelled north to Manchester by train I made my return journey by
the poor man's taxi, hitchhiking. It was my first experience of hitching and it
took a lot longer than I expected. I had been staying at Mike's flat in Salford
(known to us in the south as the backdrop to my mum's favourite TV soap opera,
'Coronation Street').

Hitchhiking. Waiting. There is a dreadful stretching of the time vector of reality.
The hitcher stands with his or her thumb projected and waits. Aeons of time pass
until someone takes pity on you. Eventually I got the lift I wanted. All the way to
London. By the wee small hours of the next day I was in Waterloo Station looking at
train schedule boards.

The next train to St. Helier station, Morden, Surrey was soon after dawn so I would
have a few hours to wait. I sat down on a bench and waited.

I read a book. I stared at the clock. I read a book. I walked up and down a bit. I
sat. I stared at the clock. I read a book.

A man came up and sat on the bench beside me. Did I want a cigarette? 'No thanks, I
don't smoke'. Did I mind if he smoked? 'No, that's fine.'

The guy began to make idle conversation. Eventually he got around to inviting me to
sleep at his place. I told him 'Thanks for the offer but I needed to be there to
catch the train when they started running'. He seemed to misunderstand and acted
slightly hurt by my refusal. I explained again that I was perfectly happy reading
my book and waiting for the trains to run. He resumed the idle chatter which was
beginning to annoy me as I really wanted to get on with my book. Nevertheless, to
be polite I responded, a little absently perhaps, to his chatter.

As we talked a police car entered Waterloo Station. It's a big station with arches
where supply vehicles can enter and exit. At night the police do routine sweeps for
vagrants. I hadn't been aware of this before but I learned it then.

The police car stopped and two uniform officers approached. They asked basic
questions like name, address, age, and 'what are you doing here?' It seemed pretty
simple, straightforward and routine until they finished by informing me that I had
been 'cautioned'. I'd never heard this piece of police jargon before so I didn't
know what 'cautioned' meant. I asked and got only a sarcastic laugh in return. I
asked again, and again, and again. Each time the only explanation the police would
give me was a grin, a wink to each other and a sarcastic laugh. Meanwhile the other
chap sitting on the bench was getting very nervous and agitated, whispering to me
to 'Just leave it'. But I wouldn't 'leave it' because I felt I had a right to know
what this so called 'caution' was all about. Eventually one of them replied to my
question with a question of his own, 'Do you object?' he asked me.

'Object to what?' I asked. 'What do you mean?' I was still only 18 years old and
completely baffled. The policeman repeated, 'Do you object?'

'Object to what? What does cautioned mean? And what am I supposed to be objecting to? What do you mean?'

Once again the police wouldn't give any reply except for a sarcastic laugh and then
they got back into their car and drove off. The guy sitting on the bench made a further offer of a bed for the night. I thanked him but declined and he wandered off home.

I went back to reading my book until the trains started running again and then I
bought a ticket to St. Helier station in Surrey.
A couple of hours after dawn I was back at my mum's house in Canterbury Road,
Morden. I was a bit apprehensive of what sort of greeting I would receive after
being away for a few weeks but, in the event, it was a lot less dramatic than I'd
feared. After explaining my travels and experiences to my mother and my sister Alex
and apologising for the strange abruptness of my departure I went upstairs to my
room.

My room was still as I had left it. There were still more than 2000 comic books in
the cupboard. There was still a collection of old broken radios from junk shops.
Still pictures on the wall clipped from Jim Steranko Marvel Comics and stuck onto
groovy paisley psychedelic background paper. My record collection was still there
with the soundtrack to '2000: A Space Oddysey', The Beatles white double album,
'Hot Rats' by Frank Zappa, my old Bing Crosby records and my Dave Brubeck singles,
my Tchaikovsky records (free with 'The Great Musicians' magazine), my boxed set of
five Glenn Miller albums from the 'Readers' Digest' magazine, my 'Fly Doubleback'
re-issues of Tyrannosaurus Rex albums and all my other weird albums and singles
which represented an attempt to remain unbrainwashed in a world which I believed
was brainwashing everybody with phony 'fashions' and 'trends'.

There were my books, my drawings, my spiritualist newspapers, my copies of
'International Times' and 'Gandalf's Garden' and 'Peace News' and 'Prediction
Magazine' and 'Man, Myth and Magic'.

I lit some joss sticks and put on some music. I was home.

I was 18. I had no idea what direction my life would take but I knew I could draw
(when the creative energy decided work correctly) and I thought I might be able to
write. I had a less than adequate education, no friends (unless I counted the
people who ran my favourite sci-fi and comic book shop in Covent Garden), a strong
belief in religion and a very vague idea of which religion it was.
I decided to get a job, save up some money and then set out on another great
journey to explore England.

Days slipped by. Weeks slipped by. I didn't find work. I wrote lousy poetry and
drew naive comic strips. I lived in my mum's house and had no money. Time slid by
as I disappeared further into my own head and thoughts.

I began visiting the 'Labour Exchange', a government sponsored office which
advertised job vacancies. Most people who went there were claiming unemployment
benefit. Not me though. I had principles and objected to claiming 'the dole' on the
grounds that that would imply acceptance of the so-called 'government' as a
legitimate ruler of the land. I had never heard of anarchism and I believed my
anti-government philosophy to be entirely religious and nothing to do with
politics.

I really had very little idea of politics or any social system but I felt, on
principle, that I shouldn't claim unemployment benefit because no one had ever
given me the choice about whether to support the idea of a welfare state. I was
against because there was no freedom of choice, no 'opt in' or 'opt out' regarding
the system. I was angry at the idea of having to claim back my own money which the
government had taken from my wages against my will. So I didn't claim it. But I
knew I couldn't go on living on my mother's generosity for much longer. I needed to
get some kind of job.

I began to build a new identity for myself, combined from books I'd read. A
character made up from comics and novels. My name was Smith, so I became 'Wayland
Smith'. Why? Simply because Wayland Smith was the only person called Smith who
appeared in ancient myths regarding the gods. I was Wayland Smith and I was some
kind of wizard. The wizard Wayland Smith. Weaver of spells, of poetry and potions.

Well, I tried to write poetry but the spells and potions were completely imaginary.
I was 18 and teenagers spend so much time trying to be grown up that it's easy to
forget that the mind is still in a transitional state from child to adult. The
teenage mind still likes to play games. To pretend stuff. To conjure up pretend
personae through which some sense might be made of the world.

While my mother and sisters were downstairs watching the goggle box I was up in my
room, reading science fiction, or 'Prediction' (a horoscope magazine) or something
similar. Sometimes I'd be reading about yoga and meditation in books from the
'Atlantis' bookshop in Bloomsbury. I had a couple of books by Aleister Crowley,
'Moonchild' and 'Magick in Theory and Practice'. I hadn't really read them but I
had skimmed and dipped into them and had a vague idea of the subject matter. I was
particularly interested in Crowley's attitude toward fiction. He suggested that
fiction and fantasy were sources of magical power. It seemed as though it might be
possible to become something by acting or playing like it. This suited exactly the
eighteen year old role playing mind I had as a young pre-adult.

I began to dress in black and other dark shades like navy blue and charcoal gray. I
already had a liking for the beatnik look and the dark mysterious wizard role
seemed to dovetail in with the beatnik idea nicely.

I would sometimes walk around the neighbourhood wearing my dark clothes and
carrying 'Magick in Theory and Practice' under my arm. I would go to the downs and
climb trees and then sit in the tree, feeling magical. I climbed hills, followed
the course of rivers and streams, whittled at sticks with a penknife. One stick I
fashioned into a crude writing implement which I then dipped in India Ink to make
scrawling marks on rolled up paper. I would sit in cafes drinking a cup of tea and
trying to look 'strange' if the other customers glanced my way.

I listened to a lot of Tyrannosaurus Rex, Quintessence and the Soundtrack album
from 2001: A Space Odyssey. Things with a sufficiently 'weird' and 'magical' sound.

I wrote. I drew. I created a comic strip series called 'Li'l Hippy'. He was an
obnoxious little kid who ran around in every episode waving flowers and getting
over-excited about comicbooks and saying the word 'man' at the end of every single
word balloon.

I wrote the beginning of a science fiction novel set in a future, post-apocalyptic,
Wimbledon where dispossessed people tried to eke out a living on a radioactive
version of Wimbledon Broadway and were helped by a strange creature called 'Teen
Angel' who was really the spirit of a dead teddy boy from the 1950s who had
returned to Earth to inhabit the body of a robot called L.V.S.17 (or 'Elvis' 17 -
using the Isaac Asimov method of converting the letters in a robot's serial number
into a name). Embarrassing juvenilia influenced by my older sister Keeley's
romances with teddy boys when I was only very little. I vividly remembered being
threatened by one of them when I was only about 10.

My younger sister Alex had moved on from going out with skinheads to going out with
hell's angels (they had motor bikes and skinheads didn't, so no contest). Alex
tried to get me interested in Led Zeppelin but, in those days, I thought Led Zep
wasn't weird enough for my tastes. Tchaikovsky was much weirder because nobody but
me ever listened to him (round our way, that is). I was going all out for
strangeness and individuality while Alex was trying to fit in with rock culture.

I had come to be more and more of the opinion that the government and the media
were manufacturing fashions like 'mods', 'rockers', 'hippies', 'beatniks',
'skinheads', 'hell's angels' etc. as a way of tricking young people into wearing
recognisable uniforms and following predictable behaviour patterns. I also believed
that drugs were secretly encouraged by the authorities as a way of doping everybody
up and criminalising them at the same time. Doping everybody up would ensure that
revolutions would always be abortive because the doped mind cannot reason
sufficiently to get organised. Criminalising everybody ensures that the police
don't need to be polite or serve the public, or at least, not that sector of the
public which the covert forces have succeeded in selling dope to.

I had read a lot of underground newspapers by this time and was fully clued up on
the CIA dope conspiracy, which followed on from the British use of opium to subvert
the Chinese Empire way back when European empires and others competed with each
other for power.

One day in early 1972 I left the house dressed in black shoes, black trousers, navy
blue coat, black shirt and black tie with a black polo neck jumper on under the
shirt. I had Aleister Crowley's 'Magick in Theory and Practice' under my arm. I
walked up Canterbury Road and turned right into Green Lanes. I crossed the road to
the central isle of Green lanes which was an old country footpath preserved from
developers. Traffic went by on either side of the central isle but, like many
people around the area, I liked to walk along that old footpath, between an avenue
of trees. I liked the fact that this old footpath and its trees had been preserved
into the modern world and that we could still walk along there as though in a
special timewarp which the motorists couldn't destroy.

As I walked along, toward the railway station, two men got out of a car and crossed
over toward the central isle. They seemed to be walking determinedly toward me. They quickly caught up with me one of them stood in front of me and told me he was a police officer and he wanted to ask me some questions. As I walked past I replied
with "No, sorry, I'm in a hurry to get to the railway station, can't stop." The two
men positioned themselves in front of me again and said they needed to ask me some
questions. I replied, "No, sorry, I haven't got time. I need to catch a train and
there's only a few minutes to get to the station."

At this I was arrested manhandled toward a waiting unmarked car.
Down at the police station I was locked in a cell and asked about my name, where
did I live, what did I do for a living, etc. All standard questions to which I
repeatedly answered that they had no jurisdiction over me since I had never voted
for them, had never agreed to their form of fascist government and did not support
their evil twisted ideas in any way, shape or form.

They set about tracing my home address from the contents of my pockets.
While I was held in the cells one particular detective, a man called Doyle,
assailed me with accusation after accusation. He was of the opinion that I was 'a
queer', 'a nancy boy', a weirdo', 'a pervert', 'a druggee', and that I did things
to men's bottoms, or allowed men to do things to my bottom. He seemed really
excited while throwing all of these accusations at me. His blood was up.
Doyle called another officer, a uniform policeman, into the cell and got him to
hold my left arm while Doyle held the other one. They lifted me up and rushed me
forward to the cell's little toilet cubicle, then they made as if to push me into
the cubicle. I gripped the sides of the doorway with both hands and propped both
feet against it as well. I pushed back for dear life, preventing them from getting
me into the toilet cubicle. "Come on, come on!" screamed Doyle, "What's the problem
matey? 'Cause you LIKE toilets, don't you?? All you poofters?"

I remembered an article I had read in an underground newspaper. It was a
description by Allen Ginsberg of how he had survived an anti Vietnam War protest
where the police and national guard were busting hippy heads with nightsticks. He
had chanted "OM MANI PADME HUM" over and over and had been preserved, like Moses
crossing the Red Sea, by the power of faith. I also remembered talking about this
article to the devotees at the Radha Krishna Temple in Bloomsbury. One of the
devotees told me he believed Ginsberg's story but also believed that chanting the
Hare Krishna mantra would be even more powerful.

"Come on! Don't you want to go in toilet with us MEN?" screamed Doyle.

"Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare, Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama
Rama, Hare Hare," I chanted, getting louder, "Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna
Krishna, Hare Hare, Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare, Hare Krishna, Hare
Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare, Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare,
Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare, Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama
Rama, Hare Hare, Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare, Hare Rama,
Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare, Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare
Hare, Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare."

The uniform police officer stopped pushing and let go of my arm. "What's up?"
quizzed Doyle toward the other man.

The uniform officer stepped back and away, shaking his head. "What's the matter?"
asked Doyle, also letting go of my arm. The uniform officer shrugged. "I don't
think this is what we should be doing," he replied. He opened the cell door and
walked out, followed by an angry Doyle.

I stood alone in the cell. Doyle's voice could be heard arguing all the way down
the corridor as they disappeared through some other doors.

I sat in the cell and waited. I was there a couple of hours. As I sat I reflected
that God/Krishna/The ultimate truth and goodness of the universe by whichever name
you choose to call it had come to my aid and intervened, causing the uniformed
police officer to experience an epiphany, a satori, a road to Damascus conversion.

"Wow." I thought, "Wow."

(This is a chapter from my book: 'How I Came To Be' which is published on the Internet under a Creative Commons 3.0 licence - It may only be copied for non-commercial purposes. Any copies must carry the author attribution (written by Peter-David Smith) and there must be no derivatives. As long as these rules are followed the work may be non-commercially distributed. I would appreciate a message being left here at my blog to inform me when the writings are being used elsewhere. And the same applies to all my blog entries. Thanks).

Chapter Fourteen: How I Became Very Deluded

2010-04-25T19:33:00.000-07:00

The first time I ever got my hands on a clarinet I was 78 years old. It was in 2031. I got my hands on a saxophone for the first time that same year. They were both instruments I had always wanted to play. I enjoyed playing around with them and attempting to learn a tune but, at 78, I certainly wasn't going to make the grade for Young Musician of the Year.

I got my first electric guitar in 2010, when I was 57. Another instrument I had always wanted to play. I'd had cheap acoustic guitars since the 1970s and taught myself to strum on various DIY open tunings. I was only in my 20s then and full of youthful energy. I began to feel slightly less useless each time I learned a new musical trick.

I had no formal training and it sounded pretty dreadful most of the time, though I succeeded in playing something resembling the blues and a few odd jazzy bits. I discovered how surprisingly easy some Pink Floyd things were and how difficult some Chuck Berry sequences could be.

I went to a crap school. I might've mentioned that already. They didn't allow us to get our hands on any musical instrument in case we broke it. They tried to steer us away from 'arty farty' interests like poetry or music and towards simple 'down-to-earth' practical interests like woodwork, metalwork, sport and getting ready to fight in the next war.

At home, me and my younger sister Alex used to stretch rubber bands around the big brass handles on the sideboard in the living room. We'd hit the brass handles with a teaspoon and be rewarded with a brilliant clear ringing tone TINNNGGG! Then we'd Twaannnnggg the rubber bands TWWAANNNNGGG!
So we'd got DIY music insofar as a single note tingggg and a single note twannng could be considered music.

One Christmas we asked our mum and dad for something called a 'Beatles Guitar'. They were selling these in Woolworths and they weren't too expensive. They were an obnoxious shade of pink plastic and had the autographs of the four Beatles printed on the side. Imagine our dismay upon unwrapping the present on Christmas morning, only to discover that these 'Beatles Guitars' were only toys and could not actually produce a musical note. They had plastic strings tied onto the neck and strung along the length of the 'guitar' just like real strings but could not be tightened or adjusted in any way to produce a note. In addition, all the strings were the same thickness and all made a dull thrum when we attempted to strum them. It was not, and could not be, a musical instrument.

Still, nevertheless, we had to put a brave face on it and pretend we were pleased with the gift. We didn't want hurt our parents feelings since we had begged them for one of these useless pieces of junk and they had spent their hard earned money getting it for us. We pretended to enjoy pretending to play the pretend guitar.

A few years later, in early 1969, just after leaving school and beginning work for Rupert Murdoch's company, my sister Alex told me she 'knew somebody famous' and 'you'll never guess who it is'. Well, I couldn't guess. 'Go on,' said Alex, 'Try and guess.' I suggested Laurence Olivier, Harold Wilson and the Incredible Hulk but it wasn't any of those. 'You'll never guess!' exclaimed my excited sister with all the childish glee her twelve-going-on-thirteen years could muster. 'Well, if I'll never guess then why are you asking me to try?' I retorted.

Little Alex and her friend Fiona from a neighbouring prefab insisted I go with them up to the flats in Basinghall Gardens to see this mysterious celebrity who was supposed to live there. I knew the flats well because they were on my paper round. I went with them, up in the lift to whatever flat on whichever floor to meet whoever it would turn out to be.

When we got to the flat they excitedly rang the doorbell and, after a few minutes and some grumpy 'Well I don't know who it is, do I?' noises from within the flat, the door opened. Standing there, looking irritated and smelling slightly of fish, was a thin young man with long hair and a generally 'Rolling Stones' sort of look about him. Alex and Fiona proudly introduced him as 'Jeff Beck'.

I had never heard of Jeff Beck and said so.

An awkward moment followed in which the two girls tried to convince me that Jeff Beck was a very famous rock guitarist and that I must've heard of him. I emphatically had not.

The man (whoever he was) seemed 'unwashed and slightly dazed' as Bowie would one day say. He also seemed surprised that I hadn't heard of Mr. Beck and even more surprised to learn that, though still only 15-going-on-16 years of age, I was nevertheless three years older than these two girls who had been hanging around in the vicinity his flat recently. He didn't seem too pleased about any of this.

The alleged 'Jeff Beck' character asked me what music did I listen to then, and I rattled off a list including Donovan, The Glenn Miller Orchestra, Tchaikovsky, The Beatles, The Monkees, Simon and Garfunkle etc. but our putitive rock guitarist wanted to know who was my current favourite. I declared that this was Donovan. I began to describe the wonders of the 'Donovan's Greatest Hits' album I'd recently bought. The supposed rocker took this with some thoughtful hmm-ing and retreated into the safety of his flat while admonishing the three of us to 'Go away and don't come round here any more'. I was perfectly happy to comply with this, my sister and her friend slightly less so.

In May, Mickie Most produced at least one session with Donovan fronting the Jeff Beck Group and singing "Goo Goo Barabajagal (Love Is Hot)". I've always wondered about the reason for that. Did we meet an actual rock guitarist whom I, in my ignorance, failed to recognise? Did I influence him to work with Donovan?

Events like this have led to my eventual deluded state. There was the time, in 1971, when the TV series 'Dixon of Dock Green' mysteriously made an episode about a man who, being held in Dock Green police station, refuses to answer questions and tells the police officers that it is 'None of your business', the exact same words I said (over and over) when I was being held at the little police station near the Old Bailey. At the end of the episode Dixon comes out to break the fourth wall as usual and comments that since the man was revealed at last to have broken no laws he was quite right to say it was 'none of our business'. 'Evening all'.

Did they make an episode of 'Dixon of Dock Green' based on the events of my wrongful arrest? The arrest for which the City of London Police would later try to apologise? These sort of very unlikely, but factual events would contribute, over the years to my eventual delusion of being the subject of study, talked about in high places, watched and monitored. A classic delusion of inflated importance.

When you think the TV newsreader is making an oblique reference to you personally, you know something's not right in your thought process.

However, these delusions were still years in the future and I still had all the adventure of working in Fleet Street to look forward to, and then the adventure of leaving that job and travelling down to Brighton and over to Stonehenge in the west, then to Manchester and trying to build a new life as some sort of beatnik or hippy.

Manchester didn't work out too well for me. There was little to be had in the way of work and none at all for a southern twit who didn't know what day it was. I enjoyed the cheese and onion pies and the dandelion and burdock, I stayed a week or so in a crashpad belonging to a guy called Mike who tried to get me interested in smoking dope (I still wasn't keen on the idea and chose to wait until I was a bit older before deciding about it) or drinking alcohol (I was old enough now to drink alcohol legally but still didn't want to - I couldn't explain why). Then I tried to become a pavement artist. I'd always been good at drawing so I bought some chalks and set to work trying draw some amazing thing on the Manchester pavement. Something people would throw money at. I tried. I failed. I realised I had lost the ability to draw.

This was a very distressing time for me. More than 200 miles from home and now I couldn't draw! I was pretty upset. Since then, as I've got older, I've come to understand that creative energy isn't one hundred per cent reliable. Creative energy is a trickster god, it comes and goes when it pleases. At 18 I didn't understand that yet so I was very puzzled by the wonky piece of 'not good, not good at all' that I produced with those chalks in the shadow of the Mancunian Way.

Depressed and confused, I decided to return to Surrey and figure out a new plan.

(This is a chapter from my book: 'How I Came To Be' which is published on the Internet under a Creative Commons 3.0 licence - It may only be copied for non-commercial purposes. Any copies must carry the author attribution (written by Peter-David Smith) and there must be no derivatives. As long as these rules are followed the work may be non-commercially distributed. I would appreciate a message being left here at my blog to inform me when the writings are being used elsewhere. And the same applies to all my blog entries. Thanks).

Chapter Thirteen: How This World Came To Be

2009-10-25T03:38:00.001-07:00

In the beginning, a very long time ago in another part of space, the universe began. It began with all of the matter and energy (which is the same thing) existing within one infinitesimal point in time and space. Now, at that time the things we call time and space didn't exist yet, so therefore I lied when I said it was a long time ago. It wasn't a long time ago, it was now. Also, at that time space didn't exist yet, so therefore it wasn't a different part of space, it was right here.

Anyway, so all of the matter and energy (which is the same thing) was (or is) here in this eternal moment of space-time-matter-energy-all-in-one-sort-of-thing and always was/is.

As if all of that wasn't difficult enough to comprehend something else happened. It changed.

Without any external force acting upon it (for there was no external force) the cosmic singularity suddenly decided to explode in all directions for no reason at all, thus setting the precedent that things can happen by themselves without any process of cause and effect.

Once it had happened time began and space came into existence. Thus the beginning of time is an event occurring in time and space (which is the same thing).

The beginning of space is likewise an event occurring in time and space (which is...well, yeah, take that as read).

So then this universe thing begins expanding outwards toward infinity. So then, also for no reason at all, cause and effect suddenly become essential to everything which happens (in spite of the precedent set to the contrary).

Except that the universe isn't expanding at all. The shape of the universe is a cone. This fact causes the observed phenomenological universe to have the appearance of an expanding dynamic system when, in fact, it is following a linear pathway along the course of the cone shaped universe. In other words the stars and galaxies are moving along a space continuum which has a big end and a small end. As the galaxies move toward the big end they appear to be expanding but they are not. Instead there is merely a bigger space between them. The distance to the edge of the universe never changes because there is no real expansion taking place. The illusion is rather similar to the medieval view of the Earth's apparent flatness within an apparent geocentricity.

Anyway, the galaxies contain star matter and around some of the stars are planets. The gods made the Planet Earth and the other realms where corporeal life can exist. The gods constructed Earth as a tree of branching futures and a tree of branching pasts. The oblate spheroid is merely how it looks in a limited number of dimensions.

Humans walked the Earth and talked to the gods. The gods gave the humans language and fire so that there could be book burning. The flood came and went and so did the staircase of babel. Humans built roads and temples and libraries and still, outside of time and space, this was/is all in the here and now of the original singularity, the beginning, the end and the current of creation.

Are we expected to believe all this?

Fish swim, birds fly, people talk rubbish. It's a defining characteristic of the species.

It would be possible to reduce all the stories in the world to a few simple plots. But only by throwing out all the details from those stories. Or, to put it another way, only by throwing out all the interesting bits.

Imagine a scale. Imagine a piano keyboard or a rainbow or a periodic table of the elements. Any scale will do. Imagine some sort of system structured as a scale, with a low end, and high end and a series of graded steps, stages or units in between the two extremes.

Now imagine that one end of the scale represents chaos, gibberish and meaningless flux. The other end of the scale represents logical, linear, cause and effect behaviour of people, places and things. All the strata in between are stepping stones between order and chaos.

Somewhere, at about the fifty percent mark, fifty percent order and fifty percent chaos, exists the narrative we construct about the origins of the universe. And that's how this world came to be.

(This is a chapter from my book: 'How I Came To Be' which is published on the Internet under a Creative Commons 3.0 licence - It may only be copied for non-commercial purposes. Any copies must carry the author attribution (written by Peter-David Smith) and there must be no derivatives. As long as these rules are followed the work may be non-commercially distributed. I would appreciate a message being left here at my blog to inform me when the writings are being used elsewhere. And the same applies to all my blog entries. Thanks).

Chapter Twelve: How I Came To Be A Pedant

2009-10-25T03:36:00.000-07:00

Many years ago Benjamin Franklin and then, after him, Noah Webster proposed changes to the spelling of the English Language. The intention was to 'rationalise' the spelling. The result, however, has been to create a second, equally irrational system. So we now have two authorities on the spelling of English, and neither of them rational at all. Instead of rationality we have mere conventionalism. Here are some examples of the differences:

Words ending in 'gue':

Analogue, Dialogue, Catalogue, Plague, League, Vague. In American English these words become: Analog, Dialog, Catalog, Plague, League, Vague. So some of them are changed and others are left alone, producing a system which is equally as irrational as the original.

Words and phrases using 'fence':

Offence, Defence, Garden Fence. In American English these become: Offense, Defense, Garden Fence. Here the change has been applied where it is to a syllable but not applied where it is to a word.

Words ending in 're':

Theatre, Centre, Spectre, Sombre, Sceptre, Mitre, Fibre, Calibre, Metre. In American English these words become:
Theater, Center, Specter, Somber, Scepter, Miter, Fiber, Caliber, Meter. Except that 'Theatre' and 'Theater' are both used in America, perhaps because of the love for Shakespeare.

Words ending in 'our':

Honour, Valour, Colour, Flavour, Humour, Harbour. In American English these become: Honor, Valor, Color, Flavor, Harbor.

Words ending in 'ise':

Organise, Rationalise, Conceptualise, Wise, Clockwise, Enterprise, Nationalise, Privatise, Surprise, Disguise, Exercise, Televise, Advise, Merchandise. In American English these words become: Organize, Rationalize, Conceptualize, Wise, Clockwise, Enterprise, Nationalize, Privatize, Surprise, Disguise, Exercise, Televise, Advise, Merchandise. Some changed, some not bothered with. To 'prise open' and to 'win a prize' in British English are condensed in American English to one spelling 'prize'.

Another one of these condensations occurs with the words 'licence' (noun) and 'license' (verb) in British English which become 'license' for both instances when used in American English.

Words with different syllables:

British 'Orientate' becomes 'Orient' in American but British 'Orientation' remains unchanged. Logically it would become 'Oriention' if the shortening were applied in a comprehensive way. I believe there are other examples of this occasional shortening but I don't have a full list of them.

Two words from British English have been given entirely new meanings in American. The word 'Smart', which means neat, tidy and well dressed has been given in American English the meaning of 'Intelligent'. The word 'Dumb' which means mute, unable to make a sound has been given in American English the meaning of 'Unintelligent'. Thus two words have been given a pairing of opposite meanings to which they have no particular connection in their original British usage. What does it imply? We must, apparently, put on a suit and talk a lot if we wish to be thought 'smart' and not 'dumb'. Being a quiet, thoughtful, scruffy intellectual I resent this.

When I was a boy I remember seeing American comic books where the spellings 'All nite' (for 'All night') and 'The man who walked thru walls' (for 'The man who walked through walls') were used. This was the sort of thing which made English teachers in Britain develop a measure of distinct anti-American feeling. In my secondary school, back in the mid-1960s, there was an English teacher who had grown up in the days of the British Raj in India. He was very old, probably past retirement age but still teaching English. He was the first ethnically Asian person I'd ever had contact with and his attitudes were of that very old fashioned sort found amongst loyal Indian British scholars in those days. He would not allow us to use the the word 'alright'. If he ever heard us using the word 'alright' he used to come down on us like a ton of bricks. 'I never want to hear you use that word 'alright' again,' he used to say, 'Never again! There is no such word as 'alright' in the English Language! That's an Americanism!' It made him visibly angry.

My dad was Canadian and my mother was Irish. They both had International English, which is usually the same as British. The slight differences were in pronunciation. My dad would pronounce the British word 'aluminium' in the American way as 'al-oo--minum' and words like 'Worcester' and 'Gloucester' as they were spelled, rather than 'wooster' and 'gloss-ter' (which is what the English make of them).

When I was a little boy my primary school teachers lectured me against copying my old man's way of speaking and set me on a path of BBC pronunciations. However to this day I still say the words 'library' and 'strawberry' as they are spelled and not the 'li-bree' and 'strawbree' which is preferred by most of the English people.

For the future? What will the English language become? Probably one of many colloquial forms of Planet Earthspeak.

I think one of the great strengths of English is its ability to take in words and phrases from other languages and make them part of the elastic form of English itself. Perhaps the 'irrationality' of English is a necessary part of the flexibility and elasticity which makes such accommodations possible?

(This is a chapter from my book: 'How I Came To Be' which is published on the Internet under a Creative Commons 3.0 licence - It may only be copied for non-commercial purposes. Any copies must carry the author attribution (written by Peter-David Smith) and there must be no derivatives. As long as these rules are followed the work may be non-commercially distributed. I would appreciate a message being left here at my blog to inform me when the writings are being used elsewhere. And the same applies to all my blog entries. Thanks).

Chapter Eleven: How I Came To Be Alternative

2009-10-25T03:32:00.000-07:00

In the late end of summer in 1971, at the age of 18, I came in on a train from Brighton's seaside delights, heading westward and inland to the City of Salisbury in Wiltshire. I guess I didn't have a sufficient respect for Salisbury's ancient history and architecture, I mean, my attitude was that I was just passing through, heading for Stonehenge.

I was mad keen to see Stonehenge. I mean this was the oldest, strangest most inexplicable thing in the island of Britain and I needed to be there. Right there at a meeting with the cosmic psyche arranged in a circle of stone.

I'd been reading about Stonehenge and Glastonbury for a few years and I was nearly THERE.

Now, you need to understand that this was 1971, so Stonehenge and Glastonbury weren't associated with music festivals. These places weren't associated with loud music or drug trips, they had just barely begun to be associated with hippies. This was 1971 and these two places were ancient monuments of religious or archaeological value, old and special and holy, to be revered.

I contemplated approaching Stonehenge with religious awe and respect.

I got into Salisbury in late afternoon and had one hell of a toothache starting. I always ate too many chocolate bars and sweets in those days. Miraculously I didn't get fat. However, the sugar and caffeine content in the chocolate, tea, coffee, sweets and soft drinks was so high that I lived on the edge of my nerves all the time. I was continually rushing from place to place with ideas about the universe and time and space and whatever careening around inside my brain. The fats were burned up by the constant activity.

The tooth was beginning to make its grievances felt as I stumbled with my bags, bongo drums and sketchpads from the train and down the road to a cafe for more caffeine and sugar. I was in jeans and baseball boots, a black poloneck sweater and a smart-looking Canadian Air Force jacket.

I had a cheese sandwich, played T.Rex's 'Get It On' on the jukebox and took the last of my codeine tablets. In 1971 codeine was in common usage as a stronger alternative to aspirin, eventually the law would change, codeine would be re-classified as too strong to buy over the counter and would become a prescription drug. In 1971 we were still in blissful ignorance though. I was taking what I imagined to be a perfectly harmless toothache remedy and took two tablets.
If only I had realised that I was combining sugar, caffeine and codeine to make a triple energy burn up combination.
Unaware of this I strolled around Salisbury seeing the sights and waiting for dark so I could find some place to crash. I was beginning to get used to the idea of sleeping under the stars.

When the sky had darkened sufficiently I headed out of town on foot to the nearest bit of hillside where I could get some rest. The toothache began to throb. I ignored it.

Up on the hill, under a tree, looking down on the old cathedral city, I tried to sleep. The toothache got worse. I tried to ignore it. The toothache got worse, and worse. I breathed the night air and stared up at the stars. At least it wasn't raining. The thought if I couldn't sleep I could at least rest. The toothache got worse. And worse. And worse.
Eventually I drifted in and out of shallow sleep.

I awoke at dawn and tried to write some poetry, then tried to sketch the scenery, both with mediocre results. After a while I climbed down the hillside and walked back into Salisbury. It was too early for the shops so I walked around and around the streets until somewhere would be open.

It took a couple of hours but the shops and cafes eventually began their busy day and I was able to get tea with toast and jam. Then I went out and found a chemist shop for some codeine tablets.

At last the toothache began to subside. I made sure I had enough codeine to last me for a week or so. I also stocked up on a few food and drink supplies to carry with me on my journey. I had a nine mile walk ahead of me to Stonehenge.

The day was fine and the sun was pretty powerfully present in a blue blue sky over Salisbury Plain. I hiked along the road, glad that I had done all those route marches in the ATC, all of them good practice for this trek to the holy place of the Ancient Britons.

I passed by Old Sarum and continued on my way, politely saying no to the occasional offer of a lift from passing cars. I wanted to make this pilgrimage on foot, to savour it as I felt my soul getting closer to the place of the Ley Lines, the place of the Energy.

As the day wore on I got closer and closer. Eventually, I could see the Stones themselves in the distance.

I slowed down. I approached, keeping my eye on the ancient bluestones. There it was, at last. Stonehenge.

When I was ready I walked right up to the wire fence erected to keep the public out. There was a ticket booth but I wasn't ready for that yet. First I wanted to stand there and gaze through the fence for a while.

The bluestones were as I had seen them in photographs, but the sheer size and physicality of them impressed me very much. On the other side of the wire an American nuclear family group was doing the tourist thing, running all around the stones and taking pictures. The father of the group noticed me standing on the other side of the fence. He came over and hissed conspiratorially at me, 'Hey! You want tickets?'

I shook my head and carried on staring reverently at the holy stones. Eventually I decided I was ready to go and get a ticket from the booth, then go in and actually touch the great old stones.

It was a very thrilling experience for me and one I will always teeasure. At the time the American guy's joke seemed crass and annoying but I see the funny side of it now. I don't suppose he realised he was in a holy place to be treated with respect like a church or a synagogue.

When I actually explored the stones themselves there was feeling of disappointment. It was an interesting place, but not quite as magical as I hoped. I didn't feel any ancient power rising from the earth or blowing in the wind.

At the end of the day I slept under the stars again on Salisbury Plain and, in the morning, headed for the railway station. It was time to continue my exploration of the land of my birth by making my first journey into the north of England. I caught a train to Manchester.

Now, the furthest north I had ever been, at that stage of my life, was Wolverhampton in the midlands, a depressed looking town in what used to be called the County of Staffordshire. The eldest of my three sisters had moved north to Wolverhampton and we had visited her bit of the family there occasionally. In those days even travelling a mere 100 miles north involved a bit of culture shock so my expedition to the far flung city of Manchester meant journeying into a strange land of mysteries.

I had an address, a contact. I had phoned ahead and I knew I had to find M.A.G.I.C., The Manchester Alternative General Information Centre. M.A.G.I.C. was the Manchester bit of the then growing 'Alternative Society' a movement to peacefully change the world by rebuilding all essential services from the grassroots upward. The idea was that if the state doesn't give you adequate housing you make your own, if they don't give you adequate transportation systems you make your own, if the government doesn't provide adequate healthcare you make your own, and so on. Alternative housing, alternative transport, alternative healthcare, alternative education, alternative arts centres, alternative industry, alternative reastaurants, alternative literature, alternative music, alternative fashion, alternative religion, etc. etc. etc. This whole system of alternatives was theoretically connected together by Information Centres to keep everyone informed of what was happening and how the non-violent revolution was progressing. In London B.I.T. (Binary Information Transfer) was the name of a major information centre and M.A.G.I.C. was its Manchester counterpart.

I had the address from International Times and had arranged a 'crashpad' with M.A.G.I.C. This means a free or donation based temporary accommodation in someone's house or flat. Like an alternative hotel or hostel.

British Rail carried me north over fields and towns to eventually deposit me at Manchester Piccadilly Railway Station. From there I found my way through the city to M.A.G.I.C. Information Centre, an old shop premises with a living accommodation behind, filled with paper and printing equipment for the local newsletters.

A young couple in their 20s ran the place. John and Marie. They looked like most hippies, long hair, the man bearded and in jeans, the woman in ankle length Pre-Raphaelite dress. They welcomed me in and told me the rules of the stay. They'd had a bad experience with a previous guest who, they said, had wandered around the place in his underwear leering at Marie. I promised them I would keep my trousers on and do no leering. They seemed satisfied with this assurance and offered me tea and food which I gratefully accepted. I explained that I hoped to stay in Manchester for some time and find work there. They said they'd probably be able to find me another crashpad location where I could stay a bit longer until I was settled.

And that's how I began to be part of the Alternative Society.

(This is a chapter from my book: 'How I Came To Be' which is published on the Internet under a Creative Commons 3.0 licence - It may only be copied for non-commercial purposes. Any copies must carry the author attribution (written by Peter-David Smith) and there must be no derivatives. As long as these rules are followed the work may be non-commercially distributed. I would appreciate a message being left here at my blog to inform me when the writings are being used elsewhere. And the same applies to all my blog entries. Thanks).

Chapter Ten: How I Came To Be A Pilgrim

2009-09-27T11:16:00.001-07:00

At 15 I was on an orienteering exercise organised by the Air Training Corps. We had to find our way by maps and compasses along the Pilgrim's Way near Guildford and Dorking in Surrey.
The day chosen for the exercise was one of the rainiest days I've ever seen. The sky was the colour of battleships in anger and the trackway was a mudslide throughout the whole journey. The gods threw lightning bolts and giant buckets of slop at us and we slid down gullies and squelched up slippery slopes.

The corporals who led us were dirty-mouthed boys who told us filthy jokes about husbands coming home to find wives committing adultery and stories of the terrible and always dirty-minded revenge taken upon the wife's lover by the outraged husband. There was a recurring theme of locking private parts in a toolshed vice and setting fire to the shed.

These same corporals zealously ensured that we younger, more innocent kids knew the words to the dirtiest marching songs. The rhythm of the marching induced a sort of Stockholm Syndrome in us so that we came to accept these dirty songs and jokes as part of the deal when learning to be an airman.

The Pilgrim's Way is part of an ancient, even prehistoric, track used by the pre-Christian tribespeople of Britain to cross the southern part of the island. It gets its name from the fact that it was adopted in Christian times as a route by which Christian pilgrims could make their way to the shrine of Saint Thomas à Becket at Canterbury Cathedral.

We went there, it seemed, to swim in the mud. We ended up pretty cold, miserable and wretched. We were trying to feel a marvelous sense of achievement but having little success.

For some reason I had worn foot crippling metal devices inside my boots. They were not designed to be crippling, they were actually supposed to correct my fallen arches, but they felt more like they were hard at work making sure I'd never walk again. I masochistically kept the blooming things in the boots and marched on, up to my shins in muck and more muck.

Every now and then we stopped under trees and consulted maps and compasses. Thanks to these devices we always knew exactly where we were: (lost).

Throughout the rest of my life, as I've striven for some kind of religious ideal and tried to understand the meaning of our human existence I've always been able to reconnect with that feeling of cold, wet, wretchedness struggling along the Pilgrim's Way up the backside of Surrey.

Religion has always been the central point of my life. But which religion? I started out with Methodist Church Sunday School and then began to be interested in Buddhism. Eventually I was on a quest to discover the truth of all the religions and spiritual philosophies.

When I worked in London as an office boy I began occasionally visiting the Hare Krishna Temple, which, in those days, used to be in Bloomsbury. I chanted and listened to readings from the Bhagavad Gita. I was given Prasadam, which is the delicious spicy food prepared by the devotees and blessed by being offered to the gods.

In Bloomsbury I also found the Atlantis Bookshop which had literature on every kind of occult and spiritual subject, tarot cards, I Ching, Astrology, Yoga, Aleister Crowley, Alice A. Bailey, Rudolf Steiner, Astral Travel and all the rest. In addition to this there was the British Museum close by with artifacts from Ancient Egypt. It was my kind of place and I learned a lot there. I bought many strange books at Atlantis and other occult bookshops I found throughout London, including Crowley's 'Magick in Theory and Practice'.

Meanwhile, I was still collecting science fiction books and comics. My head was full of magic, superheroes, gods, angels, fairies, pentagrams, stars and symbols.

When I left home for the first time I began to travel around England, trying to learn as much as I could about the land of my birth. I went to Brighton and slept under the stars, on the beach and in the park. I found the fortune teller's booth on Brighton Pier and went in to get my palm read.

The palmist was called Eva Petulengro and she published her own magazine of astrological predictions and advice. At the end of the magazine's editorial she wished everybody 'Kushti Bok' (Romani for 'Good Luck').

Eva Petulengro read the tarot cards for me and also the palm of my hand. She told me I had 'a book in me' and that I was 'scared of green'. I had no idea what these comments were supposed to mean, but I took it as very mysterious and interesting anyway. I thanked her and continued on my religious quest across England for truth and meaning in life.

The weather wasn't too bad and sleeping outdoors was quite pleasant in the late August of 1971. I caught a train westward, to Salisbury, heading for an important centre of psychic energy, Stonehenge.

(This is a chapter from my book: 'How I Came To Be' which is published on the Internet under a Creative Commons 3.0 licence - It may only be copied for non-commercial purposes. Any copies must carry the author attribution (written by Peter-David Smith) and there must be no derivatives. As long as these rules are followed the work may be non-commercially distributed. I would appreciate a message being left here at my blog to inform me when the writings are being used elsewhere. And the same applies to all my blog entries. Thanks).

Chapter Nine: How I Came To Be Totally GaGa

2009-08-12T10:44:00.000-07:00

Is it really 2054? Am I really 101 years old? It seems incredible that I've reached such an age. Of course I stopped smoking back in the 1990's so that's been a help, plus I eat a very healthy diet and I used to get plenty of exercise before I was in this chair.
People think I've got Alzheimer's because my memory isn't always accurate but what they don't realise is that my memory never was accurate in the first place. When I was in primary school, at the age of 6 or 7, back in Cotswold Road School in Belmont, the teachers used to call me 'the little absent minded professor'. That was their nickname for me, 'the little absent minded professor'. They said I was the brightest boy but I kept forgetting things. They called me 'Professor Brainstawm' and they gave me a Professor Brainstawm book as a prize for English. Professor Brainstawm had about 50 pairs of glasses on top of his head because he kept forgetting they were there and then he had to get a new pair. Or was it because they were all for looking at different things? At different resolutions? Oh well, something like that...
Of course, since then my memory has taken a few knocks. At the age of about 10 or so I was given an overdose of Nitrous Oxide Gas at the dentists. That could've caused brain damage. My parents should have sued both the dentist and the anaesthetist. But they didn't think of things like that back in those days. Then there was all the brainwashing in the 1970s. Hypnotism and brainwashing. It created some false memories I'm sure.

I used to think, sometimes, that some of my experiences belong to one universe and some to another universe, like different quantum probabilities in history. But how would I remember both of them, the two different versions of an event? Is time like a tree, which branches outward, splitting to the left and to the right? Through one door and the other door? Boy oh boy, can I mix metaphors or what! Or is time converging inward? Two completely different pasts converging to become one present?
Or is the structure of time like both of these models? Both converging and diverging from moment to moment? That would make it like a web, or a net, a network...

I've often observed the average person's lack of ability to think in 4 dimensions.
From childhood onwards I had the ability to cross a road by aiming at where the space between the cars would be when I'd get to it, not to where the space is now. Other people don't seem to get this.
Sometimes car drivers slow down and then I have to recalculate while walking.
Sometimes, in a busy shopping centre, people try to walk straight through me as though wasn't there. You'd think I was bloody invisible. They don't seem to be able to think ahead to see where I'm going to be when I get there. It's frustrating. I'm surrounded by idiots everywhere I go.

I've been thinking in four dimensions ever since I read 'The Boys' Book of Space' back in about 1960 or so.
I remember it said if you wanted to send a spaceship to Mars you would need to aim at where Mars would be several months in the future, not where it is now. There would be no point in aiming at where it is now because by the time you got there it would've moved. I understood.

I understood immediately. I was a bright boy. I've been thinking in four dimensions ever since. I've always tried to explain it others but very few can get it. Or maybe they just don't bother trying. It's very frustrating, trying to explain to people who really don't want to know.

And they're just as ignorant of history, too. It's the same difference both ways. They don't want to see where the next move will be and they don't want to know where the previous ones were either. Very annoying.

Some people seem to think my long hair is something to do with the 1960s and the hippies. That's what they think. Giving away their ignorance. Hippies didn't invent long hair, not by a long chalk. Not by a long chalk.

Long hair has been the normal style for men and women alike throughout most of history.
People who cut their hair short where usually religious fanatics like Oliver Cromwell and his Roundheads or Joan of Arc. They were usually monks or nuns or some kind of religious fanatics. If they weren't religious fanatics then it was usually illness such a scalp infection or something. Even then they'd probably where a wig.
It is normal for people of both sexes to have long hair. They didn't start all this short hair stuff until 1914 when the First World War broke out. Then they made all the men cut their beards and hair off to be in the trenchs. Fear of infestation, in the trenchs.

After the war the short hair became a badge of honour. They'd forgotten what peacetime man should look like.

So many people these days are ignorant of history. They're wearing World War One militaristic style haircuts and they don't even know it. Very annoying.
Even back in 2018 when we had the Centenary of the Armistice. They still didn't see how important hair was. Very annoying.

Of course, they don't really think of hippies in the 1960s anymore. I suppose it was 50 years ago they used to think that. Now, they don't even remember hippies. I don't know what they do remember. Big Brother used to be in a book called '1984' by George Orwell'. Then people were conned into thinking it was the name of a reality TV show. I don't know what they think now. I'm out of touch, I suppose.

It's funny to see the young people walking around looking at their 'Gridscreens' and 'Pinpods' and their 'Ghostmedia' in much the same way I used to walk around looking at a good book when I was young.

People think my memory's gone but, actually, it's the one thing which hasn't gone!

And that's how I came to be totally GaGa.

(This is a chapter from my book: 'How I Came To Be' which is published on the Internet under a Creative Commons 3.0 licence - It may only be copied for non-commercial purposes. Any copies must carry the author attribution (written by Peter-David Smith) and there must be no derivatives. As long as these rules are followed the work may be non-commercially distributed. I would appreciate a message being left here at my blog to inform me when the writings are being used elsewhere. And the same applies to all my blog entries. Thanks).

Chapter Eight: How I Came To Be A Timewarped Beatnik

2009-07-05T17:16:00.000-07:00

In my childhood Saturdays were very special. After the weekdays of the getting up early to do a paper round and then run to school to be ritually humiliated in a thousand ways came this special, wonderful Saturday time.

Me and my sister were members of 'The Sutton Grenadiers', a film club at the local 'Granada' cinema in the nearby town of Sutton. The cinema put on a Saturday Morning Picture Show which began with sweets and prizes and a singsong to the 'bouncing ball' on the movie screen. Then the lights would be dimmed and a variety of films would be shown, including adventure films, comedies, shorts, old black and white Laurel and Hardy episodes etc.

We wore little plastic badges with 'Sutton Grenadiers' printed on them and it seemed very exciting to be part of something special each week. We were supposed to get a special bag of goodies on our birthday. According to legend the goody bag would contain special sweets and free vouchers to get into the film of your choice. When my birthday came the 'goody bag' notification letter didn't arrive until a couple of days after the event. When I presented the letter to the box office I was told it was too late and I'd missed it. Typical.

There was chalk pit in Sutton. It was across the road from the Granada cinema and down a bit, on Carshalton Road. The chalk pit was a great wonder to me. It was an enormous white hole in the ground, occupying an entire block of the town, bounded by Carshalton Road on the north side and by Sutton Court Road on the south. Mechanical digging machines and men worked away at the bottom of the pit, digging out chalk to be commercially processed for use in schools and what not. It seemed amazing that the neat little English town had a giant hole in the middle and that the hole was white in colour. Other towns in the North of England had black holes in the ground where the men would dig for coal. We had a white pit of chalk. It was like looking down through the Earth's crust into another world.

There was a little row of shops precariously balanced on the edge of the chalk pit. It was a constant source of wonderment to me that they were allowed to remain there. They always looked about to fall in to the pit.

One of the shops was a little barbershop where my dad would take me to get the militaristic short haircut which was common in those days. Another in the same row was a hobby shop.

At first the hobby shop interested me only slightly. It sold stamp collectors' stuff, model trains and miniature military replicas. Nothing I could afford. Then I realised the owner of the shop kept a box of secondhand magazines on the floor, next to the counter. This became a box of wonders to me. In it I found American comics going back over several years. I found Fantastic Four from issue number one onwards and early issues of Spiderman and The Incredible Hulk. I found Superman and Superboy and Batman and Green lantern. I also found 1950s comics from E.C. Comics and Charlton. All for pennies and tuppences!

The hobby shop on the edge of the chalk pit became a special part of my life and I visited there very often. I began to build a collection of comics like no other kid's in the area. I had British Air Ace and Commando Comics and back issues of 'Flight' magazine (which were also in the box of wonders and contained pictures of all the interesting aeroplanes of Britain and the world). While the owner of the shop was chatting with customers I sat on the floor choosing which comics and magazines I would buy with my pocket money. Sitting there was a happy, magical time poring over the amazing oddities in the box. Approaching the shop was also a magical experience. Walking along the road by that strange old chalk pit to this funny little shop perched halfway out onto empty space. It didn't seem to be part of the same universe as all the 'normal' things which obey the laws of physics.

The owner of the hobby shop wore a beret and people in Sutton said he was a beatnik. I'd heard this word before and had met art students who were supposed to be beats, according to some. In those days most British people in Surrey seemed very square and there was a whole different way of looking at the world. People didn't swear very often and when they accidentally let slip a swearword they would usually apologise for it. The preacher at my Sunday School gave us little kids a very serious talk about the evils of swearing and made a very strong case that we should never, ever use the 'F'-word. He didn't realise that, at that age, I thought the 'F'-word was 'fart'. Men still wore trilby hats or, if they were civil servants, bowler hats. Cars were made in England, which still had a manufacturing industry. Women wore corsets. Many people still imagined smoking was good for you. There was a women's clothing shop in Sutton High Street called 'Swanky Modes' which was not thought of as a ridiculous name. Grocers and greengrocers and chemist shops and ironmongers and fishmongers and butchers all still existed and had not yet been superceded by American style supermarkets.

The idea of beatniks became increasingly interesting to me. They seemed to be featured in lots of TV shows and movies of the early 60s and I liked them. Doctor Strange was the beatnik superhero, a master of mystic arts who lived in Greenwich Village, New York and astral travelled into other dimensions where the laws of reality functioned differently. I liked that idea.

My reading of science fiction began to seriously influence my perception of the world around me. I read some stories in which a person is kidnapped by aliens and placed in a virtual reality environment which they imagine to be be the real world. They continue in the aliens' fake version of life on Earth until some small clues reveal the deception and 'reality' is unmasked as as mere elaborate cage in a virtual reality zoo. I began to wonder how I would know the difference. How could I prove whether I was in the real world or a fake version of it? It became an ongoing puzzle for me.

I tried to work out a way to create an artificial world around an abductee.

My first attempt at imagining such a construction had a treadmill underfoot and movie screens in front, behind, to the left and to the right. Another movie screen above.

The screens would show a fake reality on all sides of the abductee. As the human walked forward the treadmill would create the false impression of covering distance while the screen in front would show an approaching world and the screen behind would show a receding world.

As the years of my childhood went by I worked out various versions, each time attempting to achieve a more believable simulation of reality. At the age of about 14, in 1967, I hit upon the idea of filming the world through a fisheye lens and then projecting the result onto a hemispherical screen. Two of these hemispherical screens would connect together to form a 'goldfish bowl' in which the abductee would be trapped. The distortion of the fisheye lens would match the curvature of the two screens so that the illusion of a 3d picture would be created. I wasn't sure how the treadmill thing would still work but felt there had to be a way. Of course, I didn't have the equipment to try the experiment in the real world but I could imagine it very clearly. I felt there might be still further refinements which would lead to the creation of a completely believable false world into which an individual abducted by aliens could be placed. I didn't think I actually had been placed in such a world, but the abstract idea of HOW such a thing might be achieved was of great interest to me.

I had a chemistry set and a microscope which was in the shape of a pen, which clipped into the top pocket of my blazer. I was cruel to ants and blew them up with fireworks placed into the centre of their nests. I was fascinated by their scrabbling afterward to repair the damage and I stopped doing this when finally realised how cruel it was. I wandered through the farmer's fields studying ants and bees and wasps and leaves and berries and the bark of trees and everything I could find. I explored landscapes in books and in reality and in my head. I used to lie down on the playing field at school during the dinner break and raise my head slightly from the ground, then move my head backwards so that I'd be looking upside-down at the horizon. By this method I was able to see very clearly the curvature of the Earth along the horizon. I could see the sky as a dome.

I dreamed every night of flying through the air, above the treetops, above the houses. Flying like Superman, like Green lantern, like a bird, like a Spitfire pilot.

I wanted to travel. I wanted to see America and other interesting places like Mars and the 5th Dimension. I loved the skyline of Manhattan where the superheroes would swing from building to building fighting evil terrorists bent on global domination. I wanted to see the world.

My dad said he'd seen the world and it was the same all over. I didn't know what he meant but I knew I wanted to go somewhere anyway. I wasn't quite sure where.

Years later, in 1971, I was reading hippy underground newspapers and thinking about going 'on the road.' In early 1971 I read an article in Gandalf's Garden which put the case that a person who believes in non-violence should also be vegetarian because meat and leather are the products of violent activity. I had never thought about this before. My philosophy of non-violence had been drawn from Christianity in the first instance, from turning the other cheek. Since then I had read Satish Kumar's book 'Non-Violence or Non-Existence' and was becoming very serious about following Mahatma Gandhi's way. Now I added vegetarianism to my accumulated philosophy. I also got rid of my buckskin jacket with the Davy Crocket fringes on and stopped wearing leather shoes. Black and white baseball boots with the 'Empire Made' sticker became my chosen footwear.

As I approached my 18th birthday I decided it was time to stop being an 'office boy' and begin a transition into a grown-up. I waited until less than a week before my 18th birthday and then announced to Jean Dwyer, the office manager, that I was leaving at the end of the week.

I had NO IDEA the trouble this would cause. All normal, grown up, working people understand the value of giving sufficient notice before leaving a job.

But I didn't.

Nope. I thought it was OK to just up and leave when I felt like it.

So, in spite of all the arguments from the other staff at News Limited, I left after giving less than a week's notice and I was off 'on the road' like a latter day beatnik in the 70s. Leaving behind me the Australian newspapers and the funny old fashioned styles of the City of London, the Barristers hurrying around the Inner Temple in their silk gowns and wigs, the business men in their pinstripes, bowlers and rolled umbrellas, the gorgeous (and also sickly) smells of Covent Garden, the strange black shiny building which housed the Daily Express, the homosexual harassment from one of the Australian journalists who used to keep asking me to go home with him until Mr. Gladwin sacked him for it, the Italian sandwich shops which sold fantastic foods I'd never heard of before (such as Danish pastries and cheesecakes and apple strudels) the bookshops in Charing Cross Road, the the theatres, the cinemas etc. etc. Leaving it all behind to go travelling and explore the rest of England. On the road like a timewarped beatnik, that was my idea. To be like one of those beats in the 1940s and 50s who travelled across America and Europe and Tibet and wherever looking for knowledge and experience.

I crept out of the house one night as it became early morning, leaving a note for my mother, based on the line in the Beatles song 'She's leaving Home'. A song which kept running through my head. 'Silently closing her bedroom door Leaving the note that she hoped would say more She goes downstairs to the kitchen clutching her handkerchief Quietly turning the backdoor key Stepping outside she is free'.

I've always been a person who cries a lot and I think this is no bad thing. Leaving home was a big emotional turmoil but it was necessary and it felt good to be free at 18 and off on the open road. Besides, I thought, my sister's getting to age where she'll need a room of her own and she'll be able to have my room. Little did realise my mother would keep my room in untouched condition for my expected eventual return. My sister would still be sleeping in the corner of our mother's room like the baby of the family for at least another year in spite of my bedroom being vacant next door. Somehow this particular bit of family management didn't follow any normal logic.

I left the house, carrying my small notebook, sketchbook, pens and bongo drums and walked eastward until dawn, ate some breakfast somewhere between Carshalton and Croyden and then continued on, walking. I was wearing a black polo-neck sweater (for the beatnik look) and blue jeans. I had on a Canadian Air Force officers' jacket which I'd bought in a military surplus shop. Eventually I caught a train to Brighton, on the south coast. Now I was a real wanderer, I was on my own a whole different town. I decided to sleep under Brighton Pier, or possibly on the beach.

I got down to the beach in the evening and hung around, eating chips. I met an Irish tramp who was really old, like about 30ish. He told me he was on heroin, which I found to be an incredible idea. That somebody in real life in Brighton, England actually took something like heroin. It didn't seem like it could be real. I bought him some food and cigarettes and gave him the price of a pint. I slept on the beach.

The next day I wandered around Brighton and then slept in a park. At night I was kept awake by foxes screeching to declare their territory. I tried to write poetry, wondering what my territory was. I wondered about the differences between the 1950s, when the beatniks were around, and now, in 1971 when I'm out here in the park, exploring the world. Somehow I felt like a time traveller.

And that's how I came to be a timewarped beatnik.

(This is a chapter from my book: 'How I Came To Be' which is published on the Internet under a Creative Commons 3.0 licence - It may only be copied for non-commercial purposes. Any copies must carry the author attribution (written by Peter-David Smith) and there must be no derivatives. As long as these rules are followed the work may be non-commercially distributed. I would appreciate a message being left here at my blog to inform me when the writings are being used elsewhere. And the same applies to all my blog entries. Thanks).

Chapter Seven:How I Came To Be A Dangerous Subversive

2009-07-05T15:30:00.000-07:00

One year before I left school I decided to become an atheist. This was an unusual decision since I still believed in God.

However, my mind worked in an unusual way. I had reached an age where I was beginning to scientifically test my hypotheses. I set out to spend a year trying to think like an atheist. I figured that if God and my belief were both real then, no matter how hard I would try to think like an atheist, the truth would always find ways to reassert itself. So I tried.

It was a very cheeky thing to do. As an adult I wouldn't do such a thing. I would think it came under the heading of 'thou shalt not tempt God'. However, I was still only 14 and I 'thought as a child' so I tested the hypothesis.

A year later, as I was leaving school at 15, I resumed my religious belief almost as if nothing had changed. In reality something had changed. I had gained a few different perspectives on things. I had thought seriously about various different religions and philosophies. And I had begun to develop my own individualistic way of working with ideas.

I also tested the hypothesis that fairies, leprechauns or pixies might be found under bluebells. I went walking over the North Downs in Surrey, looking under bluebells for evidence of the wee folk. I figured I couldn't really disbelieve in something until I'd actually disproved it.

I began to write immature attempts at science fiction and I spent large amounts of time drawing. I drew various comic book superheroes and re-drew some comic pages by artists I admired.

I sent some of my work to DC Comics in New York and they returned the package with a very encouraging letter. They told me I did have talent but needed more experience. They also said they'd be happy to see more of my work anytime. It was one of the most encouraging things anybody had ever said to me.

I left school and went to my new job as an office boy at Rupert Murdoch's 'News Ltd of Australia'.

Getting out of school and going to work was a big escape for me. I was so angry since they had decided to prevent any of us from doing art exams. I went out, got an evening paper and started going through the classifieds. Someone needed an office boy at a Fleet Street newspaper office.

I phoned up, got an interview, wore a suit, impressed the office manager and was told I could start on Monday.

This was part of growing up. I had moved on from being a little schoolboy who is told what to do by everybody around him to a young man who begins to make things happen for himself.

I would be paid £8 per week and spend a significant bit of that on bus and train fares while commuting in to the city each day. Nevertheless, it was a start.

I went to school the next day and made an appointment to see the headmaster. I had a letter to hand over to him. In it my mother and father gave their permission for me, in spite of my young age, to leave school and begin work.

The interview was a brief one and I was soon a free man. When Monday morning came I had to make a bus journey to Morden underground station, the southernmost extremity of London's network of underground train lines, then a lengthy journey on the underground train into London proper.

These trains were dirty, noisy and overcrowded, like many subway systems the world over. They provided ample opportunity to read, though.

I arrived at Charing Cross station (which has been renamed and is known these days as 'Embankment') and walked the remaining distance up to Fleet Street and Red Lion Court.

The place where I was to work for the next couple of years was a small office in Keystone House, a very old building with an ancient elevator of the 'wire cage' variety which whirred and clanked up between the spirals of the crumbling old staircase to the first, second and third floors.

The ground and first floors belonged to the Keystone Press Agency, the second floor to an advertising agent and the third floor was News Ltd., staffed usually by 7 or 8 people including Mister Peter Gladwin, the London Editor, and author of 'The Desert in the Heart' a novel of hard life in an Australian mining town, Mister Gladwin's secretary Margaret Taylor, office manager Jean Dwyer, 3 or 4 Australian journalists who were semi-permanently based in London and me, the new office boy.

My work included sitting at the reception desk, greeting anyone who came through the door, answering the telephone switchboard (one of the old 'dollseye' kind), keeping files of Australian newspapers when they arrived by seamail, making coffee for the journalists and, most important of all, I was to be sent out of the office several times each day on errands of one sort or another.
I would be dispatched in a black London taxicab to addresses in Soho or Hammersmith, Chelsea or Notting Hill Gate collecting packages and press releases or advance copies of manuscripts from authors and publishers, politicians and pundits.

The journalists sent me regularly to the local newsstand to pick up copies of dodgy underground hippy publications like 'International Times' and 'Oz'. I had to collect items from Australia House, South Africa House, The American Embassy, BBC Broadcasting House, ITV Television House etc. etc. On two occasions I had to collect the 'honours list' from 10 Downing Street.

In those days Downing Street had not yet been closed off to the general public. Tourists could wander into Downing Street snapping photos of the policeman on the door. It was possible to walk through Downing Street as a shortcut from St. James's Park to Whitehall. These days, of course, security is much tighter.

The first time I went to 10 Downing Street I approached the policeman on the door, showed my letter of authorisation and gained admittance. Then I had to stand in the little hallway inside 'Number Ten' while someone checked the copies of the honours list, had me sign for one of them, and I was outside on Downing Street again with the envelope to take back to the office. The second time, one year later, was the same routine with the exception that the policeman on the door commented that my 'I am an enemy of the state' lapel badge was a bit inappropriate. I firmly disagreed but was still admitted to number ten.

My rather odd relationship with the police began from those days. In 1970 when I was still only 16 I was sent to Television House, Kingsway which I approached by way of Fleet Street leading into The Strand, leading into The Aldwych, from there to Kingsway and then to Television House. However, there was a problem. As I walked up Aldwych, reading a science fiction book as usual, navigating by peripheral vision to avoid bumping into objects or passers by, there was a protest march of some sort coming down the Aldwych the other way. I didn't take much notice of the protest march at first. There were a lot of them in those days and they were always protesting about one thing or another, wanting to stop the war in Vietnam or stop the killing in Northern Ireland or wanting Gay Rights or Women's Rights or something. I was only 16 years old and had no interest in politics or protests at all. I just wanted to read science fiction books and puzzle over religious ideas.

Suddenly I was interrupted in my progress up The Aldwych and had to take my nose out of the book to see what was happening. A police constable was telling me to go in the road with all the other protesters and to move in the same direction as everyone else.

I was bit shocked. I argued that it was ridiculous for the police to be making members of the public join demonstrations about which we had no knowledge. Absurd to be attempting to force a young boy to join a protest march he wasn't even interested in. I argued that the police were meant to be policing the protest marches rather than making people join them. I was informed that it wasn't up to me to tell the police how to do their job.

The argument continued until I was almost about to be arrested. Then a more senior officer came over and listened to the nature of the dispute. I heard the constable refer to me as a 'trouble maker'. One of the protesters came over and tried to 'help'. He was under the mistaken impression that I was one of his fellow demonstrators. He got himself into some trouble by intervening.

Eventually I managed to convince the more senior officer that I was an office boy from a Fleet Street news company and had no connection with the protest. He commented that I was 'too young' anyway. I was permitted to continue onwards to Kingsway, still, in my slightly autistic geeky way, unaware of what the protest had been about.

Each day I went in and out of the Red Lion Court office building on various errands. If I turned right toward the Pemberton Row and Fetter Lane direction I had to pass under the scaffolding belonging to some builders. As the months went by and my hair got longer I drew more and more comments and wolf whistles from the builders. In those days long hair on a boy was still viewed as unusual and rebellious. I was very puzzled about this because I knew that long hair had been normal for men throughout most of history. I knew that Oliver Cromwell and his 'roundheads' in the civil war had been notable because they cut their hair short, which was generally a sign of religious fanaticism. I knew that the short hair fashion of the 20th Century had started with World War One in 1914 and lasted for about 50 years, presumably because everybody suffered from a mass collective stress syndrome trauma from the two world wars and were not able to get back to normal peace time styles of appearance until another couple of generations had grown up. I knew these facts of history. Older people seemed to either not know or not care what peace time man should look like.

I commuted back and forth to London each day. Sometimes I went by underground and sometimes by British Rail. Each day I read books on the bus, on the train, in the office and also while walking along the street. I read 'The Lord of the Rings' and Orwell's '1984'. I saw the movie '2001' and bought the soundtrack album. I had a collection of records which included many old 45s and 78s bought for a few pennies each in secondhand shops. I had 2 versions of Dave Brubeck's 'Take Five' and a Bing Crosby 12-inch album which had 'Pennies from Heaven' on one side and 'Rhythm on the Range' on the other. I had a Glenn Miller boxed set which I'd sent away for specially from the Reader's Digest. I read more and more of the weird subversive stuff in 'International Times'. I followed an advertisement in the latter for a cosmic event in Croyden. It turned out to be two blokes sitting in a makeshift geodesic dome on a bit of waste ground and talking about how cosmic it might be other people turned up. No-one else did, though. Just me. And when these two blokes realised I didn't smoke or drink they were a bit disappointed. I think they were plainclothes policemen.

Another time I bought a ticket for 'Phun City', a rock festival at Worthing, in Sussex. I'd read that the Hell's Angels would be doing the security at the festival site. I travelled to Worthing by train in the morning, found the site and approached a Hell's Angel standing amongst the debris left over from the revels of the nighttime. I told him I'd heard the Angels were the security guards and presented him with my ticket. He looked rather puzzled and asked what I wanted him to do with it. I replied that I'd sort of expected him to tear it in two and return half of it to me, they way they did in the pictures. He shrugged and did so.

I walked away satisfied and mooched around the festival site for a while until I realised no bands were going to play until the evening. A pity.... A pity since I had a return ticket and would need to be back at my mum's house for teatime. Dejectedly I trudged back to the railway station.

In August 1970 I had my 17th birthday. My journeys around London continued. I discovered a specialist sci-fi and comics bookshop in Covent Garden. The bookshop was named 'Dark They Were and Golden Eyed' after the Ray Bradbury story. I spent an enormous amount of time there, both in my own hours and during my worktime journeys. I discovered authors I hadn't heard of before, comic books and fanzines of very weird and different styles. I published a comic of my own, written and drawn by me. It was rubbish, but it was a start into identifying myself as a creative person. 'Dark They Were and Golden Eyed' or 'D.T.W.A.G.E.' was my first experience that there could be such a thing as a comicbook dealership. A job where a person can be his own boss and spend all day, everyday, surrounded by scifi and comics. It seemed like heaven. I made a mental note that a possible alternative career to of comics artist might that of comics dealer. I had over 2000 comics in a cupboard in my bedroom. Some of them really old comics like Fantastic Four No1., Hulk No1. and other silver age stuff. I figured I could use these someday as the basis of a dealership.

I had begun to think about girls a lot. My puberty had been later arriving than most people's, what with the semi-autistic oddities of my psychological and genetic makeup and inconvenient fact of sharing a bedroom with my sisters until I was 16. By the time I was 17, however, I had a room of my own and was able to indulge in normal fantasies which would've been awkward and embarrassing before. I had a fantasy of walking through a lovely park, holding hands with some beautiful girl. Just holding hands and laughing, not much else, possibly a kiss. It was all in soft focus. A beautiful day with gentle music. I think there were trees and.... no, wait a minute, that was the flake advert from telly.... So what was my fantasy? Hmmm.... I'm getting to be too old to remember.

Once, in my journeying around London, I was sent to a movie company in Soho, London's notorious 'red light district' (in those days). On my way through the Soho streets an almost unbelievably ugly woman asked me if I 'had the time'. I replied that I was sorry but didn't wear a watch, and gestured toward my wrist, where there was, indeed, no wristwatch.
Immediately, two other policemen joined their transvestite colleague and began to question me in a sarcastic manner. Only when they realised I was an underage boy did they permit me to go without an arrest.

In 1971 I was sent to the offices of 'OZ' to collect a press release about the OZ obscenity trial. I was a long haired young man dressed in fake Dickensian style (two piece grey suit, fawn weskit with watchchain, cravat and wing collar). I had adopted a foppish manner of popping 'parma violets' into my mouth frequently and, although I didn't have much facial hair yet, there was a bit of blond hair growing on the end of my chin and it gave the impression of a goatee.
Upon leaving the OZ offices with a press release in an envelope I was actually asked questions about the trial by various reporters who clearly assumed I was something to do with it.

I suppose, at this stage of my life it would've been quite conceivable for hidden surveillance officers from something like MI5 or the CIA to have spotted me at various locations such as Downing Street, the American Embassy, The Times, The News of the World, The Daily Telegraph, The Daily Express, The BBC, ITV, OZ etc. and to cross reference this with a sighting of me near a protest march of some kind in the Aldwych. Using the old punch card computers of the day it would've been possible for my name and description to appear in some report somewhere as a possible subversive element.
So it's a good thing that didn't happen. Or did it?

I certainly had begun to believe in a conspiracy theory put about by 'International Times', specifically to the effect that the establishment wanted all young people to be brainwashed into becoming mods, rockers, hippies, hell's angels, teddyboys, skinheads etc. in order to criminalise us all and set us at each other's throats. Divide and conquer tactics. I had begun to believe that the fashions and the pop music were all there for Big Brother to use when controlling us. I made up my mind to remain unbrainwashed. I had a plan. I would listen to every sort of music and read every sort of book. I would deliberately make my thinking so broad that it wouldn't fit into their brainwashing box.

I joined a second public library, in the Fleet Street area, in addition to the one where I lived in Surrey. I began to read even more books than before. I also had the Australian newspapers and the New York Times Herald, the Manchester Guardian, Time, Newsweek, the New Statesman, New Society and Punch.

Later in 1971 I was on a routine trip across Fleet Street to The News of the World offices when a police constable of the City of London force asked me a fairly simple question. Had I seen a vehicle of so-and-so description and so-and-so registration go by there? I replied that it was none of his business whether I had seen the vehicle in question or not. This was during my period of extreme arrogance. I was 17, I had never knowingly broken any law, I didn't drink or smoke, I had never had sex, I was interested only in religion and scifi and I believed the police to be an evil fascist organisation who were anti-religious in nature. I felt very strongly that no help should ever be given to a police officer.

Now, to understand how it was possible to feel so strongly anti-police when I wasn't even a law breaker it is necessary to look at the events of the time. The underground press was full of accounts of racial attacks by police on people for being black, or Asian, or gay or Irish, or for having long hair, or for nothing at all. These stories were too plentiful to be entirely fiction and seemed, in my mind, to be confirmed by the attitude of the officer who had wanted to arrest me for refusing to join a protest march which was nothing to do with me.

So, when asked to help the police by saying whether I had seen a vehicle of some description go by I stood on the principle that I was not in any way obligated to give help to a racist, fascist organisation, which is what I believed, at that time, the police to be.

I was told I was being arrested and, when I asked the constable what he was arresting me for he said 'suspicion'. I asked 'suspicion of what'? He replied, with a sneer, 'Just suspicion'.

I was put into a police vehicle and driven to a small police station near the 'Old Bailey'.

I was held in the police station, refusing to answer questions, until they used my library card to trace my employment address. Then my boss, Peter Gladwin, came over to sort the matter out.

They kept me in a cell with the door open and a middle-aged policeman sitting on a chair in the doorway. He kept trying engage me in conversation and to wheedle out of me any information, such as my age. I refused to reply to any of his questions though. He asked me if I thought 'all this' was something to do with what was happening in America. I chuckled softly and wondered what he meant by 'all this' or 'what was happening in America', but I said nothing. He suggested that I would be surprised to learn that people working in that very police station listened to the same kind of music I liked. I chuckled again because there was no way he could possibly know what kind of music I liked, especially the Tchaikovsky and the Glenn Miller.

Peter Gladwin arrived and did some kind of deal with the police to get me released. They wanted me to sign something but I refused. They said they couldn't release me unless I did sign and I replied that they would have to keep me locked up for ever and ever then.

They realised their bluff was called and released me without signing. I was pleased that the old, hard drinking, hard working newspaperman Peter Gladwin had taken my side of the arguement, defending my right to say nothing, although I was disappointed that he had played their game and done some deal with them behind my back. I didn't know the details of what he'd said to them.

A few weeks later a representative from the City of London Police came to the News Ltd. offices and made an apology to me. I ungraciously refused to accept. He was nonplussed. No-one had ever refused an apology before.

Obviously I was an arrogant little twit at 17. Nevertheless, what I had been saying about having the right to refuse their questions was still essentially true.

It was a strange, strange world in the Britain of the 1970s. The BBC was still broadcasting blatantly racist tv and radio shows such as 'The Black and White Minstrel Show' and 'I'm Sorry I'll Read That Again', the cold war was still in full swing, homosexuality had only recently been legalised and was still illegal if the man was under 21. The police were still thinking with the same mental attitude as in the days of beating up 'poofs' and were applying that mental attitude when dealing with the return of long haired, pre-WWI, normality. The attitude of lies and of overt racism, bigotry and homophobia would eventually be clearer for all to see in the form of the unsafe convictions of the Guildford Four and the Birmingham Six.

When I reached 18 I quit my job at News Ltd. and went travelling around Britain. I had some money saved up and a desire to learn about the country I lived in. Approximately one year after the false arrest a similar thing happened again and I found myself being treated like a dangerous subversive. It began to seem as though someone, somewhere was keeping a file on me, and bear in mind, I still hadn't broken any laws as far as I know.

(This is a chapter from my book: 'How I Came To Be' which is published on the Internet under a Creative Commons 3.0 licence - It may only be copied for non-commercial purposes. Any copies must carry the author attribution (written by Peter-David Smith) and there must be no derivatives. As long as these rules are followed the work may be non-commercially distributed. I would appreciate a message being left here at my blog to inform me when the writings are being used elsewhere. And the same applies to all my blog entries. Thanks).

Chapter Six: How I Came To Bits

2009-06-29T10:39:00.000-07:00

They came in with a big ugly raygun and zapped me good.

They took out the bits that did and would.

I began to disintegrate.

They put my sugars in the Tate.

I thought I was evolved.

But instead I was dissolved.

The water flowed out of me and splashed out of the door.

The chemicals crystallised all over the floor.

That's how I came to bits.

(Copyright Peter-David Smith, Exeter, Devon 2009)

Chapter Five: How I Came To Be Very Strange

2009-05-30T09:27:00.000-07:00

I joined the Air Training Corps in 1966. I was 13. I was a pacifist. Yes.
Yes, I know, it's a contradiction. I was a teenage pacifist and I was in the Air Cadets of my own free will. We did rifle drill regularly. Marching up and down with Lee Enfield 303s on our shoulders.

The Lee Enfield 303 is a rifle used by the British Army from 1895 onwards until the 1950s. When we drilled with them in 1966 they were an old weapon beyond any other use. They all had a history, though, of usage as the primary British rifle in various conflicts including both world wars.

In 1965 the part of Surrey where my family lived was taken into Greater London. We kids didn't know it at the time (because it never occurred to the teachers at our lousy school to mention it to us) but we were now, suddenly, Londoners.

So, as a whole bunch of new Londoners unknowing we continued on with our lives, finding activities to mess around at after school. The nearest large town from our village was called Sutton and there was a squadron of the Air Training Corps there. 219 Squadron, with a little hut for our meetings, or 'parades' as they were called.

We met twice a week, after school, and drilled. We also learned about unarmed combat and the inner workings of the aircraft engine. We had a bar, where shandy was served as if it was real beer and NCOs told exaggerated stories of their sexual exploits.

My main interest in joining was flight. I loved aeroplanes, superheroes and pretty much anything which flew. I read 'Air Ace' comic books, which told tales of the Battle of Britain. At night I dreamed constantly of flying.

After a few weeks in the ATC I felt fairly comfortable with the routine of the meetings every Tuesday and Thursday night. It was different to school. It was a place where I didn't get beaten up by bullies.

I was still a pacifist, or I thought I was, but I remained childishly unaware of the strange contradiction created by holding pacifist beliefs while a member of a militaristic boys club. I suppose this is another aspect of the Asperger's Syndrome. My brain was a wiz at maths but could miss the significance of major philosophical issues which were crying out to be addressed.

I had a sort of 'code of courage' which was all my own. If a bully at school began to push me around I would stand my ground and take it but not fight back. I would stand there, refuse point blank to be intimidated, and talk to the bully about the virtues of pacifism. I would never run, never hide, and always speak up for pacifism, even when being hit. My courage came from the image of Jesus on the Cross and the early Christian martyrs. Once a teacher called me out to the front of the class to punish me for talking. He made me hold out the palm of my hand as if to be hit. Then he raised a metal 12 inch ruler up as if to strike me with it. He paused for a moment to allow me to feel as if I would be struck on the hand. Then he appeared to recover his composure and to realise that the school rules would no longer allow corporal punishment. He put the ruler aside, sent me back to my place and the lesson continued. But I felt like a hero, because I hadn't flinched.

I loved stories of World War Two, of Spitfires and Hurricanes shooting down Luftwaffe ME 109s and I never, ever thought it was in any way contradictory to my pacifism. I just didn't think of it. This seems so bizarre to me now, as I look back all these years later.

I carried on attending meetings, cleaning my rifle with a 'pull through' (a bit of rag on a string) and taking part in activities designed to prepare us lads for military service without the slightest twinge of hypocrisy because it simply didn't cross my mind.

Eventually, after three years of training and a summer camp where I finally got to realise my dream of flight (I got to go up in a Chipmunk training plane and also in glider) I saw the contradiction. The penny dropped. I woke up to the realisation that I would need to go one way or the other. Pacifism or military training. Not both.

A lot things happened that year. It was 1969. I left school and went to my first full time job. Less than a month later, my father went into hospital and died there.

Rewind the tape.

Playback again.

I left school and went to my first full time job. Less than a month later, my father went into hospital and died there.

Rewind the tape.

Playback again.

I left school and went to my first full time job. Less than a month later, my father went into hospital and died there.

Then the LCC, London County Council, which had taken over from Surrey County Council, decided to demolish the street where we lived. The house where I was born and grew up was smashed into rubble and we were re-housed further north, at Morden.

It was a hell of a year. I changed from being a schoolboy to holding down a full time job, then my dad died, then our house was demolished, then Neil Armstrong walked on the moon, then the Beatles broke up. And, oh yes, somewhere in amongst all this confusion I finally realised that I couldn't carry a gun (albeit a non-firing one) and simultaneously remain a pacifist. I made my decision and left the ATC.

I was stunned by the death of my father. I was still only 15. I only held together thanks to a strict routine of commuting to work each day and reading, reading reading. Between the twin distractions of work and literature I slowly processed through the mixed-up emotions of grief.

My mother and sisters coped without much help from me. I was useless. I would get up each day, eat breakfast and commute into London. I'd go through my daily working routine, then come home in the evening, eat meal and disappear off to my room to read stacks of comics and science fiction books. I don't think I was any help at all except that it gave my mother one less thing to worry about. The fact that I was settled in a job where I was happy meant something to her and that's a good thing. 'The boy's got a job, anyway' all the relatives kept saying, 'The boy's got a job at least.' Nevertheless, I was strangely clueless and distant, withdrawing further into my Asperger's shell.

When I left for work in the morning I walked along the road reading a book. I began to develop my peripheral vision to a greater extent than the average person. I felt as though I had a super-power. I could walk along the entire length of a street without bumping into lamp-posts, pillar boxes or passers by. I navigated around all obstacles by 'super' peripheral vision, as if it were Spiderman's spider-sense or Matt Murdock's radar ability.

On the bus I read my books. On the train I read my books. At work I read books as much as I could get away with. I lived in a science fiction fantasy world.

As the year's events continued, my life got more surreal. Apollo Eleven reached the moon. I went to my first stage play performance at the Shaftesbury Theatre in Shaftesbury Lane, west end of London. It was Hair, the hippy rock musical. I began to grow my hair long and read hippy underground newspapers like International Times (known as IT for short), Gandalf's Garden and Vishtaroon.

I began to wonder about drugs but, since I didn't smoke tobacco and didn't drink alcohol (and had no desire to do so either), I decided it was too early to be considering drugs. I read a few books on the subject, though, so I'd be able to make a more informed decision one way or the other when I got older.

My job as an office boy at Rupert Murdoch's 'News Ltd of Australia' involved the following tasks: Making coffee for the journalists, answering the telephone switchboard, keeping copies of Australian newspapers such as The Australian, the Sydney Daily Mirror, the Sydney Sunday Mirror etc., and running errands.

This latter was the most important. I had to collect copies of press releases from places all over London. This meant travelling around one of the greatest cities in the world and specifically calling at places where something interesting was going on. Places where there was something worth releasing a press release about. In the 21st Century these press releases would go out by email, I suppose, but in the years from 1969 to 1971 when I worked in Fleet Street it was necessary to go and collect a press release by hand. So I got to go to Ten Downing Street, the American Embassy, Australia House, South Africa House, The Old Bailey, The Inner Temple, Television House, the BBC's Broadcasting House and many other newsworthy addresses.

During these years I grew my hair longer and became more eccentric in my style of clothing. I began to dress like a character out of a Charles Dickens novel. I had a suit with a fawn waistcoat. In the waistcoat pocket was a chain attached to, not a pocket watch but the mainspring from an alarm clock. I had altered the collars of many of my shirts to make them resemble wing collars. I wore elasticated bands around the upper part of my shirt sleeves (in the style of a real old Fleet Street journalist). I began to wear badges. It was a bit of a late 60s, early 70s fashion to wear political, humourous or satirical badges on the jacket lapel. I wore two badges. One said 'peace' and the other said 'I am an enemy of the state'.

And I still walked along roads reading books and navigating by unusually powerful peripheral vision. I never bumped into lamp-posts, pillar boxes or passers by. I lived in the world of my books and had power to avoid confrontation with the objects of the real world.

I read every kind of book. Serious, funny, fiction, non-fiction, left-wing, right-wing, centre-wing, comic books, historical, scientific, everything. I also listened to every kind of music I could find, jazz, rock, folk, classical, everything.

I believed that the government and the advertising agencies were conspiring to brainwash us all into being stupid and narrow minded (and thus easier to control). I was determined to thwart their brainwashing by deliberately broadening my mind and intelligence as much as possible.

I travelled back and forth each day, from Surrey to London, from London to Surrey, and all around London, getting to know all the nooks and crannies of the city. Where to find the most interesting secondhand bookshops and unusual architecture.

Inside my head I suppose I was still adjusting to all the strange changes which were taking place. I had left school and got a job, my dad had died and I still had to cope with the grief, I was becoming an adult, going through physical puberty later than most kids my age (I had various genetic abnormalities), the moon landing of my beloved science fiction had become the moon landing of science fact, The Beatles broke up (this was generally considered by everyone to be a much bigger event than would normally be when a band breaks up) and, in 1971, the currency of Great Britain changed from the pound to the new decimal euro pound.

There was an awful lot for a slightly mad boy to adjust to.

And that, I guess, is a major part of how I came to be very strange.

(Copyright Peter-David Smith, Exeter, Devon 2009)

Chapter Four: How I Came To Be A Total Geek

2009-05-30T09:20:00.000-07:00

When I was about nine years old, or approximately 1962, a young student teacher came to do her work experience at our little village primary school. She was keen to prove her idea that nine year old children could be taught how computers work. This bright, clever, eager young space cadet had a whole plan worked out to get us all to understand the new technology of the 1960s.

A few words here about the history of computers up to the early sixties:

Mechanical computing had been around since ancient people, perhaps the Babylonians, invented the abacus and it had been developed further in the early 19th Century by Charles Xavier Thomas and others. Charles Babbage designed a computing machine called a 'difference engine' in 1822 and another called an 'analytical engine' in various versions afterward. Babbage died in 1871 and in 1888 William Seward Burroughs, grandfather of William S. Burroughs the beat generation author received a patent for a simple adding machine. Subsequently, adding machines became quite popular in international business usage but the more complex 'difference engine' and 'analytical engine' remained mere tinker toys until the Second World War when the first electronic computers were constructed at Bletchley Park in England for the purpose of decrypting German codes.

After World War Two electronic computers began to be developed for business use. By 1951 a British chain of teashops called 'Lyons' Corner Houses' were using a computer called LEO 1. L.E.O.1 stood for: Lyons Electronic Office 1.

From 1956 onward the British government raised funds by selling bonds to the public and these bonds functioned as a lottery where people could win a cash prize each week if their bond number came up in a draw. The number was picked by a machine called ERNIE, which stood for Electronic Random Number Indicator Equipment.

So, by the early 1960s we were used to hearing about these various electronic computing devices and we saw representations of them in movies and TV shows. They were large, bulky machines which looked a bit like filing cabinets with tape reels spinning around on the front and punched cards put in and taken out. The holes punched on the cards represented coded information.

So our young student teacher set to work to teach us nine year olds how that system of punch coded computer cards actually worked.

She used a pack of index file cards, a hole punch, a pair of scissors and some knitting needles. Each one of the children in the class had a card to write details on. We each wrote our age, name, eye colour, hair colour, etc. and then took the cards to the teacher to be hole punched along the side of the card and holes were either cut with the scissors or left uncut depending on whether information was 'YES' or 'NO' in each of the information categories. 'YES' we were over nine or 'NO' we were under nine. 'YES' we had blue eyes or 'NO' we didn't. 'YES' we had green eyes or 'NO' we didn't. And so on and so forth. Cut through the hole to make a slot in the edge of the card if it was a 'YES' or leave the hole uncut if it was a 'NO'.
Then the cards were put together in a pack and shuffled. (It felt a bit like a magician's conjuring trick being performed).

Once the pack was shuffled, the knitting needles were inserted into the holes in the cards and these knitting needles were labelled to indicated which detail of information they represented.

Our simple computing device was now ready to answer questions. When we wanted to know how many children in the class were blue-eyed and under nine years old we simply pulled out the two appropriate knitting needles and gave the cards a little shake. The cards for the blue-eyed eight year olds fell onto the desktop.

And it worked! Amazingly I found I was able to understand the basic principle of a computer though I was only nine years old and no-one would have home computing for another twenty years yet.

When I moved on to secondary school I tried to explain computers to my teachers there but they didn't get the basic principle of them and they ridiculed me for even attempting to explain it to them. They told me not to read so much science fiction. They said the world I would grow up into wouldn't have 'computers' and 'robots' and 'spaceships' and 'genetic engineering'. Oh no, the world I would grow up into would be the 'real world' of work and suffering and slaving to pay the rent. the world of fighting in a war for queen and country and raising a family. So, they informed me, I should buck my ideas up and stop thinking all this drivel about computers and robots and whatnot and start to live in the real world. They assured me that computers would never improve my job prospects. I knew they were wrong. And I knew it was only a matter of time before they'd be eating their words. So I kept on reading that sci-fi.

And that's how I came to be a total geek.

(Copyright Peter-David Smith, Exeter, Devon 2009)

Chapter Three: My Experiences In The 1960s

2009-05-30T09:13:00.000-07:00

So I found myself in a school which was, in almost every way, opposed to the development of art, poetry and the finer feelings amongst its students. Many of the teachers seemed to be either unqualified or under-qualified for their roles and some of them had an active hatred for children and for the power of the imagination.

We were driven through the usual miserable round of forced PE activities and the ritual humiliations in the classroom. I was made to stand up and be insulted and laughed at by teachers again and again and again. No matter how well I did at maths and english I was still treated as stupid. Perhaps for reading science fiction and comic books, both forms of literature regarded as 'trash' by the teachers. Or perhaps for being Irish. Or for being Canadian. Then again, maybe the reason was something else. There was plenty to choose from. I was a Christian of that variety which takes turning the other cheek seriously and declares for pacifism. I was a swot and a little goody-goody.

Probably it was a bit of all of these reasons rolled into one. As a child I kept to strict honesty and truth telling in a way that the average person would find difficult to believe. At that age I didn't yet realise how unusual my obsession for religious peace and truth actually was. There was definitely something odd about it. Most people would tell a lie sometimes. Not me, not ever. I didn't really begin to lie like a normal person until I was about 18 or 19.

In those days no-one had heard of Asperger's Syndrome but I think it's safe to assume I had it.

Outside of school hours I read stacks and stacks of books, mainly science fiction. I continued to explore the world on my bicycle and to injure myself with reckless adventures falling out of trees and the like.

My dad, a big muscular working man, was a hero to me with his wit and his kindness, his cooking and his gardening talent. He had a pleasing Canadian accent and sailor's tattoos up and down his arms.

My mum was a gentle, kind hard working person who scared the hell out of us all if she got angry, shouted, slammed doors, stamped her foot. Us kids would run out to play somewhere else and my dad would disappear to his greenhouse and the safety of his tomato plants. But, when she wasn't angry, mum was lovely, a beautiful twinkling-eyed Irish woman and a source of love and kindness.

We were so lucky to have parents who were good, kind people.

At some stage during the 1960s (and I'm not sure in my own mind exactly when it was) when I was maybe 10 or 11 or so, I went to the dentist and received an overdose of nitrous oxide gas. Now, if you know about the use of nitrous oxide as an anaesthetic in dentistry you'll realise how difficult it is to give someone an overdose. To make such a mistake requires a compounded series of negligences on the part of both the anaesthetist and the dentist. Nevertheless, somehow they managed it and I was transported into a physical-mental-emotional state of delirium. My mother took me home crying and giggling and crying my eyes out. The worst bit of it was that I was unaware of the state I was in. A woman in a newsagent's shop gave me some comics, and then some more comics, and then some more. My mum led me out of the shop wailing and crying as I clutched the comics. I asked my mum, 'Why did that nice woman give me all the comics mum?' 'To stop you from crying,' replied my mum. 'But I'm not crying,' I replied, seriously believing this to be true, even as I continued to sob and sniff. I was in another world.

Of course, it never occurred to my parents to sue anyone. People just didn't think that way in the 1960s, or, at least, not in the working class of England.

At school I sank into a lower grade and became the cleverest boy in a class of kids generally considered substandard. They taught us algebra and I got it immediately but the following two years they taught us the same algebra over again for the benefit of the majority who didn't understand it. I just had to tread water. Going nowhere.

The music teacher gave us two years of singing old folk songs from books while she plonked away on the piano. We were not allowed any hands-on contact with musical instruments in case we broke them. After two years the boys in the class were so restless the music teacher couldn't control them anymore so she refused to teach our class. This meant we wouldn't get music at all. The music teacher said she was glad she wouldn't be teaching our class anymore because she didn't want to be responsible for the boys all going out and forming rock and roll bands. As the class shuffled out the door the teacher took me to one side and told me in confidence that she would be willing to take me as an individual for tutoring, because I was 'such a good little boy'. I was horrified! She didn't think I was getting beaten-up often enough so she wanted to make me into a teacher's pet! Yikes!! Yuck!! I angrily refused her offer and told her she was quite wrong to be against rock and roll. She seemed pretty upset as I stormed off.

The art teacher didn't like art. He wanted to be a PE teacher but there weren't enough places to go round. He had to make do with being an art teacher and was openly derisory about both art and and our chances with it. I was good at drawing but you would never know it from the work I did in secondary school. We had to work with big stubby paint brushes and powder paint on sugar paper so that the most artistic 15 year old kid would be reduced to making work which would've been unimpressive in the infants. There was a glass fronted display case in the corner of the class and it was filled with high quality expensive art equipment so that the school governors and the parents could be impressed by it when they came to visit. The display case was kept locked. Permanently!

In science the boys got physics, the girls got biology and we both got chemistry. Apparently it didn't matter if the boys didn't understand biology and, anyway, it 'avoided embarrassment'. It, apparently, also didn't matter if the girls knew nothing about electricity and magnetism and no-one seemed particularly bothered if none of chemistry experiments ever worked properly.

I was made to stand in the cricket nets holding a cricket bat while the school bullies (prefects) were permitted to hurl cricket balls directly at my head and I was put into detention for moving out of the cricket ball's way regardless of whether I actually did or not.

I was informed by the teacher of 'Woodwork Technology' that my love of God and Christianity and telling the truth meant that I was a 'Uriah Heep' sort of person.

I was top of the class in all intellectual subjects and bottom of the class in physical skills like woodwork, metalwork and PE. My favourite class was religious education and I remained unaware of the existence of any religions other than Christianity until I was 14. Then the RE teacher gave us a lesson all about the life of the Buddha. It changed my world. I suddenly realised there were other religions which still existed in the present day. I had previously believed that the old religions of the Greeks and Romans and Vikings and Egyptians were they only other ones and that they were all gone. I made up my mind to learn all about Buddhism and the other religions. This was in 1967 and it soon came to my attention that the Beatles were studying Transcendental Meditation in India and George Harrison believed in some sort of Indian religion which I needed to know about.

Suddenly my religion and pacifism were fashionable and I didn't know why. Nevertheless the other kids in class were torn between trying be my friend or continuing to beat me up as usual.

When I got to 15 they told us we couldn't do GCE exams because that was a better quality of examination which only the higher classes, or streams, were allowed to do. In our class, 5C, we were allowed to do a CSE exam, which was for substandard children and was generally considered by everyone to be a millstone around a young person's neck instead of an advantage.

I was asked which subjects did I want to aim for and I said Art. The teacher looked doubtful. 'You can't do art', I was informed, 'because the school has had to tighten its belt this year and we didn't pay the fee to the exam board which does art. We didn't think anybody would be interested'.

So I decided there was nothing to do but to leave school and get a job. I looked in the paper and found an advert for a job as an office boy for News Limited of Australia in Keystone House, Red Lion Court, Fleet Street. I went up to London for the interview, got the job and persuaded my mum and dad to write a letter to the headmaster of the school granting their permission for me to leave school and start work. I had escaped the cruelty and the stupidity of school and was ready to start a new life as an office boy in the heart of London's newspaper industry!

And that's how, at the age of 15, in March 1969, I came to work for Rupert Murdoch.

(Copyright Peter-David Smith, Exeter, Devon 2009)

Chapter Two: How I Came To Be An Idiot

2009-05-30T09:04:00.000-07:00

I was born in 1953 near the village of Belmont, which, in turn, is near the town of Sutton, which is in the county of Surrey, which is in England.
The place where I was born later got annexed by the expansionist policies of Greater London, but not until 1965 when I was 12.

In my early years I was considered extremely bright, learning to read even before attending primary school. Between the the age of five and ten years I was continually told by the little old ladies who taught at the village school that I would easily pass the 'Eleven Plus', which was the the big exam everybody was nervous about. I would pass it, they told me, because I was the brightest boy in school. They sort of 'twinned' me with the slowest boy in school, a lad almost completely illiterate and innumerate, who was called Andrew. They sat us next to each other in class and encouraged Andrew to ask me for help whenever he got 'stuck'. I was happy with this arrangement because it made me feel important to be helping somebody.

Meanwhile I was given a bit of speech therapy to get over a nervous stutter and to correct my 'bad habit' of copying the way my dad spoke, which the little old ladies considered an 'Americanism'. I was forbidden to pronounce Gloucestershire and Worcestershire in the way they are spelled. They were to be Gloss-ter and Woos-ter thenceforward. I was also getting treatment described in the 1950s as 'sun ray lamp treatment' which was intended to help with my pigeon-chestedness and bad posture, though it never did. One day when I was laying on the treatment table with the sun ray lamp irradiating my chest I overheard an attendant say 'that'll never be right' and took it to heart. I felt sure he was talking about my weak little chest.

The speech therapy was much more effective and the teachers took a positive delight in my new talents at reading aloud with confidence. Combining my new verbal skills with my mathematical ones enabled me to rattle off the times tables faster and faster, like an auctioneer. The 12 times table, the 13 times table and so on up to any number of multiplication table they requested. I was on fire. I was a wizard. A prodigy.

The Eleven Plus loomed closer and I was the only one given sufficient reason by way of the teachers' encouragement to feel that I was going to grammar school.

Andrew continued to ask me for help and I continued to happily coach him in reading, writing and arithmetic. After school hours I loved riding my bicycle, roller skating, climbing trees, playing football and cricket and all the games of childhood. I also had an unhappy knack for falling off my roller skates, crashing the bike into brick walls, falling out of trees and so on and so forth, landing myself in the casualty wing of the hospital time and time again. I had stitches in my head several times. My clumsiness was matched by my enthusiasm, my enthusiasm by my courage and my courage by my recklessness. In fact I had a scar on my face from an accident where I was running with some glass and fell on it face first at the age of 4 or 5.

I had friends all up and down Shanklin Road, where we lived. It was a Surrey County Council prefab estate and we loved it. We lived in pre-fabricated bungalows made of aluminium and asbestos. The interior fittings were aluminium metal covered in lead-based paint. I cut my teeth chewing on those lead painted aluminium cupboards in those asbestos-lined rooms.

It was a two-bedroomed dwelling with my parents in one bedroom and all the kids (me and two of my three sisters) sharing the other bedroom. Very cramped and uncomfortable. We were lucky the third sister was already grown-up.

My dad worked as a stoker in the local hospital boiler room and my mum as a domestic cleaner. They were both good cooks and managed to share the responsibility between them for cooking meals and being around when we came home from school. I suppose they were very progressive in that way. An equal partnership of a man and a woman who both work, both cook and both bring up the kids. I'm proud of them for it, though I don't think they were actually trying to be progressive, it just happened that way.

I was mad keen on religion and went to Sunday School each week. My parents had no interest in religion but they let me go there and took, I suppose, some pride in my achievements when I got a certificate for bible study and that sort of thing. My dad was very skeptical and would challenge my thinking with philosophical arguments which had occurred to him.

'Adam and Eve were the only people in the world' said my dad, 'and they had two sons, Cain and Able, so then there were four people in the world. Then Cain killed Able so there were only three of them. Then Cain went out and took himself a wife.' My dad chuckled, 'Now where did the wife come from, son? Where did the wife come from?'

Another time dad said: 'All the big companies have these mining operations where they take the gold and silver and diamonds and oil out of the ground. They take and take and take and they don't put anything back. What's going to happen when they've taken out everything that's down there? What's gonna be left? Nothing! Just a great big hole in the earth. That's all, a great big nothing.'

He also told me that church people looked down upon the Jews (I had not been aware of this) and drew my attention to the irony of the church people with their bible being anti-semitic since 'the Jews wrote the bible' - or, at least, that was my dad's take on things.

The Eleven Plus rolled ever nearer and the teachers continued to tell me I would pass it and go to grammar school. Everybody seemed to agree that going to grammar school would be a good thing, so I had to accept the general body of opinion and go along with it.

The days and months rolled by, the seasons turned, my dad won the prize every year from the council for his front garden. He pottered about in his greenhouse tending tomato plants, or in his shed collecting nails, screws, different types of metal, radio valves etc. All properly categorised and placed in the correct boxes. He pruned his fruit trees, plum and apple and pear and peach. The elderberries grew along the back fence next to the blackberries and the goosegogs, in the farmer's field behind our council estate. The coal was delivered in sacks to the coal shed and we drank lucozade and lemonade and lime cordial and tea and coffee and milk and tapwater and cola. At Christmas there were presents and puddings us kids were given the treat of a tiny thimblelike glass of sherry and at Easter there were chocolate Easter eggs. And my dad went to the British Legion and drank Watney's Red Barrel and I 'Listened with Mother' on the radio except that my mother was usually out at work or busy. And milkmen delivered the milk in glass bottles and a rag-and-bone man, just like Steptoe came around collected old junk on his horse and cart, which they still had in those days. And my eldest sister was training to be a nurse and the next younger sister was helping out in a coffee bar full of beatniks and teddyboys. And I went to cubs and learned to grow mustard and cress on a bit of felt and say dib-dib-dib and dob-dob-dob and how to tie a woggle. And I got good at drawing comical cartoon characters just like the ones in my comic. And all the chimneys in the street had smoke coming out in winter and the thick fogs we got were really smog but we didn't call it that. And we read the Beano comic and the Dandy and the Beezer and the Eagle and Dan Dare and in summer we played on the North Downs and in the farmer's fields and in the old, ruin air-raid shelters where we weren't supposed to go and that just made it more interesting and exciting. And we sang carols at Christmas and played with toy soldiers and model cars and board games. And we had rain and sun and good days and bad days and sad days and boring days and dentist appointments and sun ray lamp treatment. And read books. And ate dinner. And acted silly. And played with chemistry sets. And watched mum making cakes and licked the spoon. And read Superman and Batman comics. And heard Elvis Presley records. And got colds and stomach aches and got well again. And washed behind our ears. And wondered about space ships and time machines and robots and dinosaurs and superheroes and detectives and spies and God and angels.

Eventually, the Eleven Plus arrived, the big day. They re-arranged the seating in class so we would all sit at a separate desk instead of sharing. Andrew had to sit at the desk in front of me instead of being beside me and we were all told very clearly that we mustn't speak to each other once the test had started or we would be disqualified.

The invigilator wasn't one of our usual teachers but a visiting one. She gave out the exam papers, repeated the instructions, and then told us to start.

I was flying through the test without much difficulty when Andrew turned around and whispered to me that he needed help. I had understood the instruction not to talk so I ignored Andrew's entreaties. He became more and more insistent, his whispering got louder and his tone more urgent. I continued to ignore him. Then the invigilator announced she was disqualifying both Andrew and me, for talking during the exam, in spite of my protestations of innocence.

So I didn't get to go to grammar school and, instead, I went to a rough old comprehensive school where I was bullied, not only by the other kids, but by the rough old comprehensive teachers, who considered me a swot. Rough old comprehensive teachers who tried to steer us away from 'airy-fairy' things like poetry and art and towards 'realistic' studies such as working in factory or becoming cannon fodder. I was treated as an idiot for asking the teachers stupid questions such as whether it is true that a spaceship travelling faster than the speed of light would go backwards in time.

And that's how I came to be an idiot.

(Copyright Peter-David Smith, Exeter, Devon 2009)

Chapter One: How I Came To Be English

2009-05-16T23:07:00.000-07:00

My mum told me a story about my grandad. They lived in the town of Birr, in County Offaly, Ireland.
When my grandad was young, this would be in the beginning years of the 20th Century, he went out with some of the other young men to cut down a tree in the forest. While they were there an accident happened with the axe and my grandad cut his hand badly.
The other lads bound up the bloody hand with a cloth and left my grandad propped against a tree with a bottle of whisky while they went into town to fetch a doctor. My mum said my grandad always told it this way: While he was leaning against that tree with massive blood loss and pouring a bottle of whisky down his throat all the little people, the leprechauns, came out to dance in a ring, right in front of his eyes.
The interesting thing to me about this is that the story still delights the imagination, in spite of the fact that seeing visions in those circumstances is pretty unsurprising. It's still a good story. Well, I like it anyway.

After that my grandad recovered and, eventually, was called up to fight in the First World War, the Great War, the war to end all wars.
He got caught by a mustard gas attack and became a permanent invalid. My mother nursed him throughout the rest of his life.

My mother went to a catholic school where the nuns would beat her with a stick for such trivial offenses as spelling mistakes.
She once got her hand caught in a hand-cranked machine for chopping meat. She didn't lose any fingers but she talked of the horror of the incident throughout her life.

My father was born in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada in the year 1904. He was only 10 years of age when the Great War broke out and 12 years old when the USA joined the war. He was 20 in 1924 and there is a photo of him looking smart and handsome in a good quality 1920s suit. He looks like an actor in a gangster movie.
My dad could remember the days of prohibition and Americans coming over the border to buy booze. Travelling any distance necessary to get a taste of the hard stuff. He remembered the days of alcohol being smuggled back into America in the running-board of the car.

It wasn't easy to get my dad to talk about his past but he did reminisce sometimes in a vague and dreamy way. I do know that during the depression era of the 1930s he travelled across North America like a hobo, hopping freight trains, searching for a chance of work. And he found work of various kinds including logging, lumberjacking and that sort of thing. He also worked in roadside diners and hash houses as a short order cook.

He met my mother in England. She had come over along with her brothers who had wanted to get into the war against Hitler and had come over the water from Ireland and joined up in the RAF. My dad arrived in England as a sailor in the Canadian merchant navy.

In fact dad was below decks as a boiler stoker on a ship called the Europa which had been a Danish ship until the Nazis invaded Denmark and then, since the Europa was in Canada at the time she was claimed by the Canadian government for the war effort. The Europa sailed to Greenock, Scotland in November of 1940 with a large number of Canadian troops on board. They disembarked at Greenock and the ship sailed to Liverpool in December. My dad was in Liverpool in December 1940 when the Europa was bombed by the Luftwaffe and subsequently drydocked. During the next three months the ship was bombed again and again until she was beyond repair. My dad, with no ship to return to, was in Liverpool during wartime, in civilian clothes and at a loose end. One day a woman on street corner, handing out white feathers to men in civvies, gave a verbal insult and handed one of these symbols of cowardice to my dad, who promptly hit her. She called a policeman. My dad explained who he was, which ship he was with, his journey across the Atlantic dodging submarines, the bringing of the Canadian Army to Scotland, the bombing of his ship and, finally, the handing to him of the white feather.

Well, he got off with a caution but he was pretty upset about it and went off to join the Canadian Army himself, to get into a uniform and avoid any further accusations of cowardice.

So he went from being sailor to being soldier and from boiler stoker to cook. All his old short order cook skills were put to work by the 48th Highlanders regiment. They were proud to be Scottish Canadians, wearing kilts and playing bagpipes. Dad actually wanted to be a paratroop but was disqualified from that because he was missing part of a finger and part of a thumb. This was the result of a bloody accident back home in Canada, lumberjacking. I don't know why there's this weird theme of hand injuries connecting the lives of my dad, my mum and my granddad. There just is.

The Highlanders were posted to Aldershot, my dad met my mum, the regiment took part in the liberation of Italy, the war ended, my parents made a home in England and I was born there in 1953.

And that's how I came to be English.

(Copyright Peter-David Smith, Exeter, Devon 2009)