Random Memories

I once worked in the Cabinet Office, which was a remarkable experience. One day, I made an internal phone call and was greeted by the indignant response, "Do you know who you are talking to?" I must have dialled the wrong number and was instead talking to some supercilious twit. I said, "Is this the Prime Minister?" He was a bit confused and said "No," to which I responded, "Oh, I must have dialled the wrong number then," and hung up. Times were different then. I remember playing football in Downing Street, kicking a ball against a wall. The security guards just thought it was funny as they laughed and joked with the drivers. I don’t remember security cameras. I would wander freely around amazing empty state rooms in Whitehall and the Treasury, and nobody seemed to mind. There were only two men on the front desk of the Cabinet Office, which was just a short walk away, down an old Jacobean corridor, to the back door of Number 10. The entrance was just a normal turnstile, which could have been easily jumped over. By the time I left, though, the entrance had been secured with ceiling-high glass security turnstiles. It seems incredible now, but not so long ago, appraisal of risk and implementation of standards operated by a very different compass. Rightly or wrongly, we currently live in a much more rules-based, legalistic, risk-conscious culture.

I constantly come up with hare-brained ideas that I then impulsively implement, badly. Should I add this to my CV? It just so happens though that some show signs of life before falling flat, while occasionally others work out very well. But mostly I look back and wonder at what on earth was I thinking? Why was I so stupid? Being aware of this doesn’t make me want to stop coming up with stupid ideas, only to become better at turning some of them into good ones.

Creative Moments

There were moments in my pre-teens when I was creative, that later resurfaced between the ages of 20 and 25, after which they disappeared when I was fully sucked into the demands of modern life, the zombifying indoctrination of slogans on the banal conveyor belt through the system. Eventually, worn-out and disillusioned, I became acutely aware of my mortality. I realised that if I could die at any moment, then I should at least try to download an expression of the thoughts and impulses within me. It didn’t matter if anyone else saw them; at least my existence had contributed something to the vast database of humanity. As it happened, though, I found real enjoyment in these creative moments, and I was brought back to life. Over the subsequent years, I have been improving with the consistent doing of what interests me. I’m very fit and healthy and, if fortunate, could have decades of enjoying with others the shapes and sounds that may form.

2024

Looking back at what I said I was going to do in past years, I typically allowed myself to be blown off course, and ended up doing something else more unsatisfying instead. In terms of what was created in 2023, however, it was a good year for me.

I’ve got many things I want to do, but I must focus sequentially to make me more centred and resistant to events that easily move lighter intentions.

I will focus on writing for the first nine months of the year. This will include: The Mushroom Monsters, All the World’s a Stage, and the prequel/sequel to Human World that extends the themes and connects the narrative with Stange Stories.

My focus is then going to shift to performance. I want to film my music, my poetry, and scenes from my stories. They will be shot in interesting locations and will hopefully look good aesthetically.

But why? Because I feel that’s something I have to release out of me.

Where am I from?

I’m from a little place that suddenly expanded 13.8 billion years ago. I’m not sure where I was before that; it’s been like waking up with amnesia. My atoms were forged in the furnaces of stars. My biology evolved through countless forms. I existed before I was here.

 

But, taking the close-up view, I was born in London and grew up near the edge of the M25 in Essex, eventually moving to Colchester fifteen years ago. I went to school, become an accountant, did this, did that, etcetera.

 

However, I’m really from a place of joy and wonder, as all children are. A place soon lost, locked away by foolish adult thoughts, but to where I try to return. Creativity, imagination, love, joy, mischievous playfulness – this is where I am from.

Journal 2022-11-16

I’ve been working as a software engineer with domain knowledge in finance and trading. I can find it interesting, especially when I create something useful.

My main creative, potentially commercial, outlets are: writing, acting, singing, songwriting.

Visual art is important also as a personal outlet.

My main interest overall is lifelong learning.

Journal 2021-11-25

My story so far is partly one of failing at everything, but doing just about enough at the last moment to scrape over the line. As the years ticked by, I eventually crawled a fair way. I have no regrets or pride, just bemusement.

Random Thoughts:

It is satisfying to warm up in front of a fire after numbing coldness.

Why don’t people read audiobooks on camera with autocue? Listening is great, but it would be nice to have an option to see the complete performance. Reading as a spectacle used to be a thing, e.g. Charles Dickens and his grand tours.

DIY teaches: know thy tools.

I love and hate ambiguity.

[Insert Here] is overrated.

Journal 2021-10-13

I’ve gone through phases of mainly focusing on, in turn: music, songwriting, singing, and artworks. The next up is writing, then performing what I have written. None of the activities are switched-off. It’s just I start to feel pulled more in a different direction.

Random Thoughts:

I’m winning at being slow.

Links

I’m at ReallyBobster on the main platforms. The complete list of my links is here: Links

Process of Improvement

In track athletics, runners do not improve by running all the time; in fact if they overtrain, the body does not have time to adapt to the training load and performances start to plateau, then deteriorate. Cross-training in related disciplines is a way to keep the training fresh, to exercise available cardio systems while mainly resting the tired muscles – introducing vivifying new stimuli to which the body can positively respond.

Content

This is a template outline for the areas in which I hope to contribute content over the coming decades. Everything is at robertwalker.blog, but I’ve added external links below.

It may not be practical to stretch myself thinly, but really, I see all the activities as complimentary points of interest in the same panorama.

Songwriting:

Playlist – YouTube

Singing:

Playlist – YouTube

Playlist – SoundCloud

Artworks:

Board – Pinterest

Acting:

Podcast – Anchor

Writing:

Blog – Blogspot

Screenplays – Scribd

Lyrics – YouTube

Poems, short stories, books – in progress…

Stand-up:

Comedy – planned…

Film/video:

Playlist – YouTube

Apps:

Accounting – Wibamu

Trading tools – MetaTrader

Trading system – Vimeo

Games:

Board games – Vimeo

Images:

Google Maps – Google

Board – Pinterest

Curated Playlists:

Playlist – Apple Music

Playlist – YouTube

Journal 2021-09-12

I’ve only had the phrase “do you know who I am” said to me once – I couldn’t resist saying “nope” and didn’t work there much longer. Another time, some “head of” something or other in a bank went red with frustration, muttering indignantly about “no respect”. And I still remember the look of stunned shock by an interviewer when I stood up in the middle of an interview and walked out. But the truth is, I was engaging in the same nonsense as they were.

Journal 2021-03-21

Activities in no particular order: actor, singer, songwriter, artist, writer, financial software developer.

Journal 2021-02-28

I remember as a young kid once being reprimanded by a stranger in a shop because I said that I didn’t like some latest fad with clothes (bizarrely at the time there was a short-lived fashion of wearing patches of cartoon pictures on denim). The explanation given was that it is popular, so I am wrong for not liking it too. The fashion changed a few months later and no doubt she changed to what she was supposed to like - to behave how she was supposed to behave and to insist on others behaving that way too.

Journal 2020-11-03

In the distant pre-internet days when I was a kid, I designed a board game then forgot all about it. The game actually looks pretty fun; it has a blend of strategy, risk and probability - like many good games. So I think I’ll have a few physical sets made-up, thanks to the internet and finding out there are specialist businesses that do this sort of thing.

Combining football with golf was another one of my games, which I called “Folf”. Well if I had the internet, I would have been able to find out that the sport has been around for a while and is called “Foot Golf”.

Journal 2020-11-01

I walk and run about 50 miles per week, usually while listening to podcasts.

Journal 2020-10-25

My school up to the age of 11 was unusual because I remember doing a lot of arts and crafts, singing, drama and creative writing. This type of education has probably disappeared now under the weight of standard curricula, exams and league tables.

I only really developed a passion for learning again when I had the opportunity later on, to study at UCL and Imperial College, for which I am very grateful. I think the difference was access to primary sources and the culture of novel enquiry for contributions to knowledge, rather than teaching by numbers (no matter how nominally effective).

A Contrast

A few years ago, out of curiosity and in the hope of encountering some benevolent souls, I went to a Buddhist centre in London. I could see the practical benefit in the exercises being taught and listened to some wisdom words, but was far less impressed with the paradigm of shared beliefs being propagated. There were several comments that jarred me, such as hero-worshipping and speculating in earnest as to who was the greatest recent guru; or the retelling of fantastical cosmologies as a matter of fact. My mind was truly decided, however, when music and singing were attempted: no doubt the purpose was to emote joy, but the result was blank and joyless for me. Nothing close to truth would create art – the expression of the soul – that uninspiring.

On leaving, the assembly exited the front door past two Buddhist religioners standing on either side, giving their goodbyes. The first person was everything I had hoped to find there - she clearly just radiated a sense of peace, compassion, joy and love. The second, who from the literature seemed to be the leader of the place, did not have the same effect on me; I had a feeling of disquiet and, to be honest, slight revulsion. I recognised that all too familiar look in his eye, which should not have been there in a person purporting to teach spirituality. Yes I can see you, I thought at the time, before leaving and never going back.

I think that practising the religion is great if it can help a person grow into the state of consciousness of the woman I encountered. More importantly though, the experience lasts in my memory because of the contrast presented to me between the two people: Do I want to be more like the one or the other?

Journal 2020-08-31

A lot of what I know is the product of age and curiosity, and although broad is often just familiarity with the basics. But I do also feel something expanding within me lately and I’m not sure of the cause, like energy ignited from a switch that has been flicked on.

Journal 2020-08-12

I appreciate the storytelling of real human experience, truthfully expressing core feelings that are shared by people across cultures and time. Very generally, I tend to turn to Shakespeare for plays and poetry; and Dostoevsky for deep psychological novels. Some other great writers I like to read are: Aldous Huxley, George Orwell, Thomas Hardy, James Joyce, Anton Chekhov, Leo Tolstoy, and Victor Hugo.

Journal 2020-07-30

Wasn’t Shakespeare amazing. It would be so interesting to find out how his genius developed - what he saw and experienced in his life that helped him write such beautiful words and comprehend so deeply the human condition in all its different aspects. I can think of other notable geniuses in history - Mozart in music, Newton in science etc. - but Shakespeare is a sort of mythical other, shrouded in mystery, whose breadth of insight has the greatest impact on me.