Following the activities detailed in the last entry, it was inevitable that I would end up discussing my paranormal experiences (or lack of) with curious colleagues. We talked about how conceptually strange it is that people feel a need to believe in ‘something else’. I guess lots of folk just find consolation from the thought that there is a spiritual state following physical life. Fair play to them - I can certainly see how an assurance of a ‘secondary existence’ makes mortality issues easier to handle. But what I find puzzling is how so many find it comforting that, following bereavement, their deceased loved ones will continue to be with them, watching over them in spirit form.
Personally, I am not inclined to subscribe to these ideas. Not because of any great philosophical or intellectual motive. It’s just that the thought of being permanently watched is not something I consider particularly comforting. Quite the opposite. I am socially anxious at the best of times, permanently worried about drawing attention to myself in public places. The thought that I can’t even assure my solitude in the comfort of my own bedroom because of some invisible omnipresence, is one I find truly horrifying. Especially considering some of the sordid self-debasing desires I sometimes oblige whilst alone in said bedroom. As Leslie Grantham would probably agree, some things are best kept private. And all he was doing was sucking his own finger! Imagine the terror of embarking on an act of onanism, whilst all your dead grand-dads, nans, great aunties, uncles perch themselves spectator-like at the foot of your bed, saying things like, “Hodge round Glenys, I’m trying to see what he’s doing”. And where would it stop? What if Nan invites all her mates from the old Bingo night too, all stood round chattering to one another; “who is you say? Glenys’s grandson?” Your room could be jam-packed with unprecedented occupants; previous owners of the house, the inhabitants of nearby graveyard, literally anyone!
Brrr. How awful to think you were only conducting private personal pleasure, then to realise you are actually the conductor of a public symphony of self-abuse. You couldn’t even manipulate thoughts like these to incorporate a strange boost of sexual frisson (not that I have tried). The whole thing’s enough to give you psychosexual problems for the rest of your life. And why? ... Because there’s always that one nagging doubt isn’t there... What if the believers actually turn out to be right?
Mind you, I don’t think believers themselves are THAT confident. If they were, then what’d be the point in bothering to commit their onanism in a discreet and private context? If you’re gonna be being watched anyway, then theoretically you might as well just indulge yourself wherever the urge takes you; shops, libraries, bus shelters, photocopiers, Girls Aloud concerts, scantily-clad summer streets, anywhere you like. And yet I never see any of them dare. Funny that.
