Strike a Commuter Pose

Tube Strike - DSCN4982 ep2
Originally uploaded by ericparker

I walked home today because of the Tube strikes. In an hour I was at Bethnal Green. Half an hour later I was inside my lift - just half an hour more than my usual bus ride. I just might walk home from now on. London is lovely this time of the year - that mixture of autumn colours from the setting sun but still some enduring summer warmth.

People, though, behaved appallingly today. Drivers nearly knocked over cyclists. Cyclists couldn't give a fuck about pedestrians. Pedestrians screamed at cyclists and jumped in front of moving traffic when it wasn't their turn. Everyone was frenetic to get home. I didn't see the rush. I stopped once to switch from office shoes to trainers then another for some milk and tuc tuc crackers. I got a missed phone call and when I arrived home wink_martindale told me someone related to a job application I'd made recently had rung for me. She sounded nice on the phone, he said, and she would e-mail me.

I took a bath and listened to Hurts' album "Happiness".

Wednesday 28 December 1966
Leonie rang at about six. I'd sent a telegram earlier today. She'd just got in from work. She said that Dad has gone back home. Sleeps in my mother's bed downstairs with the corpse. After his accident he can't piss straight and floods the lavatory with it whenever he goes. She said, 'Well, I'm shocked by our Marilyn, you know.' I said, 'Why, what's she done?' Leonie said, 'Oh, you know, she behaves very ignorantly all round. And when I told her Mum was dead all she said was - "I'm not surprised". Well, you know, what kind of remark is that?' Dougie was upset. Remarkable how those without hearts when young suddenly develop them in later life.

I promised to go home tomorrow. Leonie and George will come round in the evening. As the corpse is downstairs in the main living-room it means going out or watching television with death at one's elbow. My father, fumbling out of bed in the middle of the night, bumped into the coffin and almost had the corpse on the floor.

Peggy said how dreadfully reminiscent of Loot it all was.

From The Orton Diaries, edited by John Lahr