Okay to begin with is a bit of writing I’ve been meaning to write up and post for a while. Skip to the end if you want to go straight to the oh so exciting announcement. Either way share and enjoy
BRIGHTON:FRIDAY:DUSK
There’s an energy to Friday evenings in Brighton, the crepuscular air crackles with possibility, especially this evening – maybe it’s the fresh batch of students, thousands of sap filled youths falling in love with the city falling out their musty corners blinking wet with prinks, or the more savvy hens clucking wasted already and rampant stags cheap fancy dress flagging enjoying the September rates for their Airbnb’s, or just the potential energy of a million Dionysian adventures, paths crossed , hearts lifted. The entire city shrugging off the day like a sweaty work shirt and slipping into the sparkling glamour of the night. Or, maybe, because the pub prices are so high everyone has been drinking before leaving, so by half seven nearly everyone out in public is pissed.
London Road is part of Brighton that stays stubbornly ungentrified that’s not to say they haven’t tried, a couple of brand new blocks of student flats housing chain coffee shops and that ubiquitous chicken restaurant blend into the row of charity shops, ethnic supermarkets, and minimarts like store detectives blending into the beach crowd wearing comfortable hiking boots and a fleece. The manager of Presuming Eds, the local coffee house/bar/lunatic hole, says “London Rd, it’s our shithole”.
I’m walking to get food, no more plan than that, anywhere else in the world I’d feel out of place in a scruffy hoody, ripped shorts, and flip flops, but that’s the good thing about Brighton, you can never be the weirdest person on the street. Every so often kids rush past me, no older than fifteen. Some on foot, some on bikes, and even some on scooters. Normal kids, aggressively normal. None of them in the ‘roadman’ uniform of sports jacket, two pair of tracksuit bottoms and hood pulled tight. Kids in shorts, t-shirts of different colours, kids that if I saw at a playground I would assume Disney were filming a t-show on the importance of inclusion. And yes, I’m being a reverse snob. They were not just kids, these are M&S kids.
Every few minutes more would cycle, skate, scoot, or just plain old run past. Teacher-sense told me something was going on, it was kicking off somewhere, either that or a Tik-Toker had just posted from Turkish Delight Kebab from up the road. Either way not something a tired nearly middle-aged man too lazy for underwear should be anywhere near.
A yeti flies past, across the road and into the patio of the Loco Lounge. Followed by all the kids, 30 or so chasing him without looking at the traffic. Smelling blood in the worst way. Kids in a pack with diffuse responsibility and half formed empathy glands are vicious and feral. I stand back. Following close behind comes a kid on a low seated push bike, trailing behind because he’s cycling one handed. In the other is a jet of bright blue flame coming from a deodorant can. Not so much a weapon, more of a statement. A standard bearer for the next generation caught in our slow motion apocalypse.
The kids were eventually chased off by the staff of the bar, some people passing and one working class woman who threatened to fight every single one of them despite having both hands full of shopping bags. But that one kid smelling of burnt chemicals chasing a homeless man for sport will be an image that stays with me for a while.
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BRIGHTON:SUNDAY:LATE AFTERNOON
It doesn’t feel like a usual sedate Sunday, a brisk wind is churning the sea and adding an energy everybody seems to be a little frantic to stuff in every scrap of weekend before the bill arrives on Monday.
I had planned to savour this pint but a combination of habit, crisp deliciousness, and a genuine fear of the wind blowing it over has meant I’ve finished it in two songs.
Weekend Danny measures time in songs. Seconds and minutes is a Weekday Danny thing and honestly? Sitting outside my favourite pub in the world watching the sea churn and the Seagulls bully the tourists who are checking the times of the last train on their phones, I can wholeheartedly say – FUCK Weekday Danny
I’ve got a couple of hours before the sun sets properly but I’ve only got half an hour before it sinks behind the buildings and the temperature drops viciously.
Four lads sit on the beach throwing stones at the unflinching aqua and grey sea. As if the violence of the stones negate the tenderness of how close they are sitting and the sharing of that moment. I wonder if they’ll remember it in the years to come. They don’t seem that precious when you’re young, and it’s almost inevitable that during the scramble into adulthood sends the iridescent pearls of memory bouncing across the floor and into the cracks of the floorboard like a broken necklace.
I hope that I’ve lost a few of those pearls – Not so I can get them back, but I just hope teenage me had a few of those perfect sun soaked moments. I suppose its easier to be kinder to past me than it is future me.
Instead of going home I walk up the front in the opposite direction because the sun on my face feels like a blessing and sometimes it’s easier to turn and face the sun than it is to watch our shadows get longer and blacker.
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So heres the deal, I’m releasing a book! Some of you know may know that few years ago that I wrote a book about my hi-jinx in Mexico. Well me and my lovely cohorts at Paradise Circus have knocked the edges off, put it in a lovely cover and will be making it available to buy.
STARING DEATH IN THE FACE: SEARCHING FOR THE REAPER ACROSS MEXICO is a reckless and vivid true story of death, tequila, rebirth, hangovers, and redemption and will be available from Amazon for more details watch the socials or keep checking the link here