Meeting Father Christmas

In a fit of boredom did I cry "But who will go out with me? This house is empty and dark. I am alone and lonely. I need a friend!"

Thus it was that my friend Alebanditos and I arranged at the very last minute and at great expense* to go to the pub. (Aunt, I promise it gets more interesting than that ;) )

It was there that we remembered the messages.

In our first year in university, Alebanditos and I (and others) lived together in an odd triangular arrangement which just about passed for accommodation. We were getting on with our lives** (possibly just trying to have a shower) when we discovered the first message clinging to a beam on the ceiling of the shower room.

"Harry is not the town," it said, "Gregory is the village."

And it was not the last. Behind a radiator, along the skirting, on the postbox, under a cupboard we found them. Up and down, left and right, in plain sight and yet hard to see. How we did stare and marvel at the sheer unlikeliness, and how very charmed we were by its romanticism! What an incredible victory it was to discover the next - just difficult enough to find that it was a most compelling scavenger hunt.

"Welcome to No Hope Disco."

I recounted with glee to Alebanditos the fun I had that someone should think so beautifully of life to hide us these broken poems, and what a sense of fulfilment I had as I found each one. I was like a disciple to some greater plan, where life was in every act and moment of being - boiling the kettle, getting the post, doing the washing up, going to the toilet, walking down the corridor - an adventure. And right there and then his stomach swelled to three times its original size. He grew old and grew a big white beard, and I noticed for the first time that he was wearing a hooded, bright red cloak and tough black boots.***

"Actually, that was me" he said with a shy smile. "It was my project. I was given a label maker as a parting gift from work, and I used it to hide messages around the house. I wanted to see how you would react." The second part of my reaction to his project is pending, as it has been ever since it first began. I wanted to leave behind a similar gift to those observant enough to see it and curious enough to appreciate it. Since going out with Alebanditos I have searched eBay for label makers.

"I found a gem on the dancefloor tonight."

I was going to write down all those precious scraps, but time has passed and I "never got round to it", so instead I remember just these three. It is a shame ( = something to be ashamed of). I never want to lose the gems I find on dancefloors ever again. I vow to write, and be happy.

The En- oh yeah, and then on the way back Alebanditos and I got stopped by the police. They informed us that he had just committed burglary.**** They then apologised for getting the wrong guy and drove off, and we proceeded on home.


* - Not actually true.
** - Not actually true.
*** - Not actually true.
**** - Not actually true.