50YON: Wednesday, 14th April 1976
(Gosforth, age 14)
A slow start. Sleeping, then a bath, breakfast. Sitting in the sitting room, talking—drifting rather than doing.
At eleven, I begin work on my book. I don’t get far. Then, suddenly, a brilliant idea. It arrives fully formed—or seems to. A rock band, followed with a kind of religious fervour, called for peace across the world and gave the power to make it happen. A benevolent dictatorship through music. It feels important at the time. Urgent. I write it down.
After lunch, I start again. A new idea, or perhaps the same one in disguise. Somewhere near the middle, I realise I know the ending. That gives me confidence. I decide to rewrite from the start. I am easily fooled.
Still, there is something real in the act itself. Typing my thoughts feels like magic. Words appearing, fixed, external. Proofreading them later with a red biro feels almost like defacement. Sacrilege.
I call it a “super book.” Whether that is pride or self-convincing, I’m not sure. But I am inspired—to write, to make something. That feeling sits somewhere between excitement and possession: the sense that I am creating something that didn’t exist before.
Television in the evening—Luke’s Kingdom, One-Upmanship, something medical. I am very tired.
Orthodontic elastics on at night. Inconvenient. Another small imposition in a day of attempted creation.
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