No Sleep 'Til Aristotle

It's not the normal milestones of existence that make up memory - neither the standard markers that define the insanity of Christmas round robins or the daily routine events that seem to frame our craving for regularity. It is the obscure thoughts which flash across our minds and escape without ever being held in memory. See those silver letters up there - The Paradox Club or maybe just Paradox - the tower has fallen apart - broken down by elements and vandalism - but up there the collection of silver letters - the word Paradox - stays forever polished by the wind and rain. The tallest thing around here, it has decayed over the years I have known it until now and it seems forever on the edge of collapse, a broken reminder of the days before the ghost town and rebuilding made everything shiny and empty. Maybe we queued there once or twice - the blur of nights out has not left any memory of locations - just still pictures of bars and dance floors and memories of thumping music which was always far too loud to talk over - there was no call for chill out rooms in this place. All people wanted here was oblivion through alcohol or Drum and Bass. Now everyone is (or thinks they are) a bit more sophisticated, wanting something other than this rapidly fading chaos of social adhesion - maybe that should be cohesion. The lights change here and I am back in Sunday-Morning mode - all thoughts of those silver letters gone for good - except that now there is a scibbled reminder of the 30 seconds of thought that the sight of them sparked before it was forgotten again. And the weekend has gone with several things achieved but nothing actually fulfilled. It all moves too fast for real comfort or belief. And now brought back from where it was saved in my head without any chance of being recalled simply for its own sake, or even at all - just remaining as empty, unuseable space in my brain, this short memory, this single element amongst all the others has taken on importance far above all the rest. I am minded to attempt a day of full recall, to remain undisturbed by normal concerns, and to write short key reminders for a full day of remembering.

It frightens me.