Time capsule

my holiday read was Skagboys by Irvine Welsh, the wholly unnecessary prequel to Trainspotting which is likely to be soon coming on my ever-expanding, never-ending reading list

and since my girlfriend has left me home alone to go and see a deity's feet I decide to indulge myself with a glass of whisky and coke, central heating on and candles lit as winter draws ever nearer and play Danny Boyle's Trainspotting on the projector

and it takes me back, it is a sign of it's times, of course the music is pivotal to the movie and the soundtrack pinpoints a specific musical and cultural movement that was the halcyon days of 'cool britannia'

but further than than, with passing time and retrospect, I can see Trainspotting as a time capsule, preserving the past for future generations, showing them what once was

smoking in pubs and clubs is a strange one, it seems to be reserved for fiction, even when I see old photos of nights out and friends with fags in hands or mouths, it seems bizarre to me, it seems prehistoric.. do you remember when a night out meant coming home stinking of cigarettes, even if you didn't smoke? when jeans worn the previous evening in a pub needed to go straight in the wash in order to cleanse them of that nicotine stank?

and do you remember when trafalger square was more famous for it's hordes of pigeons than it was for nelson's column? the carpet of grey birds that spread across the landmark sight, the keen business men selling feed and always that one person that would have pigeons resting upon his person as everyone watched and took photos... that too is gone, consigned to the history books and mere memories

but the one thing that truly stood out for me, the one thing above all others that rang the bell of nostalgia as I sat in my cosy home in the future, in the year 2012, watching the 1996 film set in the late 1980s, was the fact that Renton and Spud were chased down after chorring from a John Menzies store

and I think of the John Menzies in Waltham Cross, and how I used to use up pads of lined A4 paper from John Menzies, and how easily it has been surpassed in my mind by the usurping W.H.Smiths

and sometimes it is strange to think of how things were, how they use to be, and how part of growing, and living, and choosing life means that we leave these things behind us



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