The restaurant's gone. I've tried to pay everyone the money that I owe
them but it just isn't there. I paid the wages up to date, managed that at
least. Gave what stock I had to the Spar and the Butcher and my fruit and veg
man but it's nowhere near what's owed. The VAT man is due anytime for his 24
grand... hahaha, 24k he wantsand I havn't got 24 pence, to be fair he's not asking for anything I don't
owe. Think my marriage is fucked too, no way left to move it forward. Only
arguments, stupid arguments, pain, recrimination, blame and counter blame.
There's nothing left, no moves to make, no deals to do, no saviours or miracles on the horizon...
I'm sitting on the top of the turret/tower
(what exactly is the difference?) of Harlech castle. There's a few ways into
the castle that don't involve paying, a few that are pretty easy under the
cover of darkness. I've come across the wall by the ugly horse statue and
climbed the wall on the castle's side, jumping a gate in the process. Not so
easy to do with 4 bottles of Bud but pretty easy compared to the climb that
followed in which one slipped out, crashing after a disconcertingly long time
travelling through the air. I'm at the top of the back left one as you look
here, the two with flagpoles are a lot harder to access as they have padlocks
on, not that that stopped me on a different occasion with a certain Mr Stokes!
I'm way too drunk to be up here and the
sky is rolling over itself like the old t.v's used to when the vertical hold
was gone. Have a fag Roy, yeah good plan. I'm trying to look up, looking for
the stars but the clouds are building and there are very few stars to be seen, if I
look down I really wanna jump. It's weird how my main concern is not dying but
surviving, If I die then it's ok in my alcohol fuelled logic but if I survive,
am crippled/maimed/brain damaged or any combination of these then I'm a further
burden on the people that I'm already letting down. So I look up, up to the sky
rolling over on itself again and again and as my eyelids sag under the strain
of staying conscious the clouds build up further and as I drift into a restless
sleep I feel the drip drip drip of the rain. My last thought is how the hell
I'll get down from here in the wet but it's not something that bothers me for
long as the lights switch off in my overloaded brain.
I never did get down to the bottom of the
blame game. Was the restaurant to blame for ruining my marriage? Was the
marriage to blame for ruining my restaurant? Your head goes round and round
when you come out the other side of a failure, personal or business and you
wonder at which point you lost the game, when exactly was it all over. Was it
one big thing or a multitude of little things adding up day by day to bring it
all crashing down. I think in the end it's a pointless exercise as no matter
what you do in life, win or lose, you learn. You learn and you grow. The pain
hurts but pain subsides, you can analyze the failures in your life as much as
you want but the fact is that you can't change them. The only thing I got to
the bottom of was that bloody castle, thankfully alive and well but soaking and
full of a cold/hangover combo!
Where's the car Roy? You promised us a car
story and here we go, moan moan moan....
3 months after sitting at the top of the
castle and pondering the continuation of life (sounds better than the S word!)
and I've cheered up a bit. I sometimes feel, as I'm sure we all do, that I have
a self destruct button. If I press it then everything goes bang. I've pressed
it a few times down the years and it always has the same effect, total
devastation! Things are looking up a bit now though, not much but a bit. I want
to get away though, away from Harlech, away from failing and away from all the
negativity surrounding it.
I'm staying in a little cottage 4 miles
from Harlech in a little town called Llanbedr. It's a beautiful little place,
isolated from anywhere with enough privacy to get me through this funk. Proper
old world country cottage with an Aga in the kitchen and a massive oak dining
table too. Quiet, isolated, and pretty damned nice, all furnished with proper
expensive stuff that comes from family history and not IKEA! It's just close
enough to town for me to walk to the pub and just far enough away to escape
into my own world and blast my music or shout if i want to.
My mate Stevie was the one who found it,
we're supposed to be sharing but he's loved up at the moment and spending all
his time with her. Either that or he's just leaving me to it as I've not been
great company. Nirvana 'Nevermind' has been on loop in the CD player for days
but I'm past any thoughts of a Kurt style exit from this world and plotting a
move away. Ready to maybe break from Blurs' 'No distance left to run' (check
out the first verse if you don't know it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QWFcM_1ye8o) and
get a bit of woohoo going instead! Fair play to Stevie, he's still paying for
this place as I have nothing. I moved what was left of my beer/wines/spirits
into the cottage and have pretty much drank the lot now and that was all I had
to offer as 'rent' so I know he's got my back.
The thing is I still want to be a father,
still want to be with or near my 3 little girls. I've been in negotiations with
Sue (my nearly ex) and we think we can tolerate each other long enough to find
a place, maybe co habit for a while until we get on our feet, maybe make it
work if all goes well... As I say, negotiations, nothing concrete. We need some
cash for a deposit somewhere, we need a car (About fuckin' time Roy!...) and we need somewhere to go.
We're looking at down south, somewhere near London where there's money and
opportunity and we're looking at going as soon as possible.
I've just come back from the family house,
my house, the one that I now feel like a stranger in and I've decided to call
into the S't Davids for a beer or 2 on the way home. I think we've got enough
cash together to move and I've been chatting to a letting agent in Surrey about
a house they have to rent. I go to buy myself a pint but Mike (not his real
name) sees me and has already ordered me one. Mike's sound, I did a bit of work
for him during my painter/decorator phase and even wallpapered one of his sons
bedrooms. He's rat arsed though, In fact more pissed than I've ever seen him and
he wants a game of pool...
We play the first game and I hammer him.
To be fair he's normally a lot better but he can barely stand and now he wants
to play for money. My general mantra when playing for anything at pool is not
to take advantage, I'm pretty good and on my day I'm unbeatable. I'm not
bragging or being big headed but I've been playing since I was knee high and
with my Dad having lived in pubs throughout my upbringing pool was one of the
only constants I had. I've had some tough lessons on the pool table and lost my
fair share of games before I reached a decent enough level, but Mike seems
totally unaware of my ability as I win the first game for a quid.
"Double or quits?" "No
Mike, you're too wrecked mate". "Are you calling me drunk?" Oh
great, here we go. How and why is it an insult to call someone drunk? I've
never got that one? If you go out to drink then the objective is to get
drunk... Then for someone to say "you're drunk" is surely just the
same as saying "well done mate, you've achieved your objective"!!
Anyhow, Mike's not having it so I double, then I double again, £4 if you're
keeping track.
"Tenner Roy? or quits"...
"Right, I will Mike, but this is the last game mate, I gotta go".
"Gotta go where Roy? haha..." I've been updating Mike on my trials
and tribulations but in his state the sympathy is not exactly forthcoming, especially now
that he's losing. "Tenner then mate" I agree, then it's doubled, and
doubled, and doubled again and we're on a ridiculous £80.00 from a game of pool
that I never wanted to play. "look mate, seriously, just forget it" I
say "buy me a beer and we'll call it quits", I'm trying to diffuse
the anger I can see mounting with every game. I won't let him win, hell no. I
won't let anyone win at pool. I spent so many years growing up earning every
precious victory against grown men who dared not lose face against the
'kid'.
"Fuck you Roy!" This is not
going to end well... "Didn't you say you needed a car?" Yeah I know,
I already told you that there's no way I'd take advantage of a drunk guy but he
won't drop it. "Best of 5 Roy, for my Citreon? I was gonna sell it
anyhow". So whilst my sensible and scrupulous side is saying no, you can't
do that Roy, It's my now slightly inebriated and less morally correct side that
comes out. "you're on mate!" I break and sink the black with the
white losing my first game of the night and Mike's finally got a victory to
cheer him up. Sadly for him I take the next 3 in a row for the match and after
some pretty unsporting insults he throws a car key at me telling me to pick up
the paperwork tomorrow before storming off.
I crash at a mates house in Harlech after
a few more bevies in the Lion and wake up knowing I can't take the car. It's
not a great motor from what I remember seeing of it but it's decent, gotta be
worth 4-500 quid of anyones money. Mike only lives up the hill 5 minutes from
here so I say my thanks for the bed and wander up. I can see the car as I round
the bend and it's parked in a wall! It looks like the handbrake was let off and
it's rolled 5 to 10 yards before planting itself into the dry stone wall that guides the road, seeing it like this gives me a fresh
perspective. No way I was taking it 2 minutes ago, now I'm not so sure. I
stroll up to Mikes’ door and knock, holding out the key for its safe
return.
"Sorry about last night Roy" is
the first thing he says, throwing me somewhat. "I was drunk and acted like
a twat... ". Well I'm happy to agree but try and play it all down as a bit
of harmless fun, wondering how much he remembers. "look mate, I woke up
with your car key, just brought it back up for ya" I say. "You won
that Roy, fair and square. I came home and... well let's just say I wasn't
happy. I'm guessing you saw the car on your way up. That was me, sorry but you
should take it. You earned it and it was my own fault". This is the Mike I
know, alter ego of Mr Arsehole from last night. He's genuine, apologetic and
happy to admit he was wrong. Takes a big man to do that. "I'm not
comfortable taking it to be fair mate", I make one more attempt at giving
him an out but he's already handing me paperwork and the other key. "Take
it Roy, and good luck with everything". And so I do.
