Facing up

With friends in the New Forest, gathering in the kitchen at night, close to the fire. We weren't friends a day ago, as we had never met, but the person who bought us together was a shared friend, a nexus, and so by her grace, we are now.

A werewolf, a man touched by death and struck by lightning, an old sea dog who has swallowed the hook and lost a family, and our sad, beautiful host. All of us loners in one way or another, we have made our way to our friends house up the ancient track, like travellers passing through the Old Wood seeking shelter as night draws in.

I look around the pool of light over the table at these new friends of mine, listening as I drink (vodka, thanks). No one grabs and holds the focus; all listen, laugh, smile and share. None of us moan or whine about our lives, we are not here to bleat, we are telling stories, horrors, yarns, histories, all delivered in a way to entertain each other, to explain or delight, or sometimes, horrify.

We are all too old to give a fuck about face or status and span class and culture to the point it disappears. The same sort of thing that has gone on for a million nights around a million fires, on plains, in caves, taverns, inns, pubs and gods help us motorway services for all I know.

There's something else too. While we talk to entertain our new friends, we are also tracing our old wounds and scars, flexing stiffened joints delineating and defining our own experiences, who we were and what we are, through the looks, smiles, frowns and reactions and comments of others. Describing our lives and the things that have changed and made us, refracting through this shared prism. This too I suspect has gone on for ever. It's not obvious or even conscious, but it's there, and beyond price.

And you know what? You can't do it via text, email, phone or facebook.
Face it kids, literally, or lose it forever.