n.n benn is fictional and autistic. this is their diary. new poetry and philosophical musings every tues, thurs and sat direct to your inbox. and while you are here, check out my videos on youtube and spoken word poetry on spotify, apple music etc (search for the love epochal)
this is a reference to lucky jim by kingsley amis. i had referenced his son a week or so prior. two witty 20th century men. they are dying out, the 20th century men of letters. clive james. christopher hitchens. milan kundera are a few i remember grieving. a lot of them died long before i was born though. george orwell. graham greene.
i think the 20th century novel will forever be tempting to me. modern enough that i understand the social relationships. but historic enough that plots don’t have to be squeezed painfully around mobile phones, gps and dna evidence. a simpler time. more scope for (getting away with) mischief.
and the 21st century novel? we will talk of the 21st century women, not men. we will talk of rooney, smith and mantel, not even bothering with first names, because these are important women of letters.
this was, is, a blindness of mine. i demand to be believed, loved and understood, but what i say may seem far-fetched, and i can come across as stand-offish and avoiding.
one thing about the daily diaristic element of the love epochal is that on review it’s sort of reassuring to see how often i swing from despair to elation. i take every loss, lurgy or setback hard, like it’s the end of all things. then the next day i’m like “today it was sunny and i had the nicest meal out and saw a deer, life is fucking great.”
i am a people pleaser. i hate conflict. i have a tendency towards secrecy. it is quite recently that i felt able to talk about how i feel and confront the issues in my life. finding out i am autistic has been quite helpful in that it has given a sort of framework through which to analyse my strengths and weaknesses. but it took a lot of therapy before i was in a place that i was even ready to ask those questions of myself.
i have always hated myself and wanted others to love me. but i am trying now to love myself. to extend the same generosity for my mistakes that i would grant anyone else.
and on and on and on. the monotony of existence. just spinning that wheel a little bit, every day. take the bins out. make breakfast. make lunch. make dinner. go to bed just when you finally got all the chores done and are excited to finally enjoy a world free from deman.
but seriously, as an autistic person who suffers from time to time with pda (pathalogical demand avoidance), it can be hard. sometimes just existing is overwhelming and just one little demand more can push me into meltdown territory.
but usually after a little break, some beta-blockers, some stimming, maybe playing my melodica for ten minutes, i find myself renewed, ready to eat my frog, and grateful for the love in my life, and for the generous people i surround myself with.
when did you last experience another’s generosity?
as an undiagnosed autistic teenager, you may not be surprised to learn i had a troubled time. social skills did not come naturally. i learn by making mistakes. to learn this way – you have to make the mistakes. i have a bad habit of breaking new things. delicate things that don’t belong to me.
i took the pain out on myself. i directed my meltdowns internally. i cut my arms to shreds. i abused substances.
last year i started getting all my self-harm scars covered with tattoos. and now, when i look at my arms, i no longer feel shame. i love my arms. nobody has arms like mine. they are perfect. they tell my story.
i was walking down the high street near where i live when i caught my lover’s scent in the breeze. i think it was coming from a foreign student who was walking past the pawn shop. i like to look at the jewellery at the pawn shop. i fancy a signet sovereign. the kind of people who buy sovereign rings are, i surmise, the same sort of people who frequent pawn shops. it takes a village i guess. i usually buy my jewellery from beach side tat shops on the med.
oh and the ‘sense datum’ was a reference to bertrand russell, from whom’s book ‘problems of philosophy’ i think i learned about sense data as an undergraduate.
i hate primary colours. way too bold for my autistic vision. i’m a soft summer poet. i live between the gaps, and my favourite gap is the teal puddle between blue and green. i guess it matches my eyes.
and the second line is a reference to ‘every morning’ by sugar ray – every morning there’s a halo hanging from the corner from my girlfriend’s four post bed. you know how sometimes in an argument you know you are wrong, but you wish you were right?
in the words of marcellus wallace, ‘that’s pride, motherfucker.’ so fuck pride. now repeat after me:
‘in the fifth, my ass goes down.’
when was the last time you admitted you were wrong?
calling back to yesterday’s quite literary post, i am suddenly reminded of a literary/confectionary connection of note. roald dahl was one of my favourite childhood authors. i am ashamed to say my inner reactionary preferred enid blyton generally. but long before i had started on adult books i had reaslised that dahl had the superior worldview.
anyway, while of course dahl famously wrote ‘charlie and the chocolate factory,’ you may be unaware he also wrote a non-fiction essay ‘the chocolate revolution’ which revealed him to be a keen lover and historian of confectionary, and a particular aficionado of the ‘golden age’ of chocolate, 1930-1937, a heady seven years of sin which saw the inventions of many of the great confections of our age of tooth decay: the mars bar, the crunchie, the curly wurly, the aero, and the ‘energy balls’ – which are now known as ‘maltesers’.
this is an almost exact quote from success (1978), by martin amis. a spiv serves terry the biggest whisky he has ever seen heard of or read about. explains that everything he owns fell off the back of a truck. i can’t actually find any evidence of this quote online. and i haven’t bothered checking my copy. chat gpt came up short.
can you verify my quote from memory? if anyone can give me a page number, i will write a variation in their owner and gift the copyright. like a blogspot picasso.
and if you are a fan of the amis literary family you will be delighted to know that martin’s father appears later in this very stanza.
from snowy summits are mountained limbs of venomous frogspawn here is to the life pudendal blessedly unaffected by format rigidity. going home, i see the most expensive chocolate bar i’ve ever seen, heard of or read about and in a fog of lousy vibes await an operative positive.
i eek out my whole being in the dance from blue to green a witching hour meltdown throws her halo from my bed post an irrepressible exhibit from the sex museum the smell of our first kiss flutters by, a primal sense datum
i turn my snout at regret—the danger made it meaningful while my teenaged self-destruction echoes on (and on) a storm steals my ride so we climb pint eat and breeze (and on, and on) it’s better to be generous to the best of your means (and on, and on) (and on and on and on and on and on)
an intractable issue that we must address, and i guess the time is nowish how can you not trust me after all we have been through? is this the end for me and you? no and today is so much better than yesterday infinitely, nice things are nicer than nasty ones so i push through the pain in warm air for a buzz later savour the flavour of copper coins on dry tongue screw a shelf on, climb the wall, nacho un [] upable then a day indoors with the bug and drive a lurgy day in bed with that sunk feeling but the incessant mind plays the hits as usual. and the bin’s full / again i rely on a well meaning soul and forgive myself.
ineluctable loggerheads with events diaristic i wrestle you onto a future plane style glistens on surf with the setting sun and we act like we what we do is demonstrably normative but life as it is now only exists as it does now and the future and the past are a million moral universes
laser quest pivot to armpit sweat and nervous stutters give a dude a fish and you’ll win favour and patronage teach him angling and your monopoly will be lost forever
you advise your charge by bringing her advice you license your obsession by granting it licence “i was sat” means to sit, you were sitting badia brand tears in the box kitchen i was sleeping when the rascal slipped in on a bonnie mission you give notice, it’s official, the last issue i’m doing my homework so you can take me with you but the poison in the fang must be expunged or the course will be hellenic, terminal, explosive let’s not let bearable be the enemy of good if you don’t keep a diary, today is a good day to start
we borderline roll with the blows and try to process you can’t control your body, but we hope we can live with it repeat my mantra: i’m working so i don’t have to try so hard jump through the hoop, dont look, and stoop under the loop are two bunnies a good omen? or was it just a dusky lamb? i scuttle home sick in the night, not ready to be seen like this here and an astral month ends, mess everywhere, a solemn verdict awaited please god let all the good souls revel in forgiveness
the love epochal. n.n. benn 