Secondary Sources

The are a few stories about my childhood that sort of do the rounds and have become (for me at least) a kind of self-mythology. I have no real memory of these events, as they primarily occur between the ages of zero and three. Based upon the secondary source material I must assume that they were my best years.

I talked early. Weird early. I was taught by a flash card wielding toddler. I had a strange sense of humour. I was bald, I was tiny and I called my rocking horse Bucephalus.

My favourite is a story about a question I posed to my father, I'm not sure what age I am supposed to have been (three maybe) when I asked him:

"Is there a colour blacker than black?"

He replied that no, there was not, and inquired as to why I would ask such a question, no doubt as confused as you are.

I said:

"Because if there was a colour blacker than black, then you could paint your house that colour, and put black furniture in the house to brighten it up."

I then laughed (apparently) for a considerable amount of time. I still find it funny.

Bubbles (childhood existentialism)

Whenever someone has a powerful thought, one of an intensity akin to love, a bubble forms. While they sleep the bubble floats out their ear and ascends skyward, awaiting that blissfull moment when it is reunited with other bubbles of its kind. That is when the bubbles get their power. They merge as one, and it is for all the world as if they were never parted, for the thoughts that produced them were the same. These bubbles grow large, up there in the sky, but as a bubble grows it become volatile, unstable. The weight of this emotion forces the bubble to tear, and this tearing is what makes thunder. The torn bubble spews out the thought it contained, all over an unsuspecting world below. It fills up buckets and drains, resevoirs and potholes. It soaks people to the skin as they walk and sooner or later everyone is saturated by the thought, not knowing where it came from. And they are confused, and act with enormous stupidity. this in itself would be ok, but not all bubbles are made from good thoughts. Some are made from very bad ones indeed.....