What have we learned?
With the masks slipping and the distancing stickers being scraped from the supermarket floors, it’s time to consider what we might have learned from the last eighteen months and what we might be doing differently. I’ve been trying to write this blog for a few days in the searing blast of a mid-July heat wave, and this is my third and final attempt. I am trying to put the pandemic in perspective and come out positive. (How I love alliteration.) The first two attempts were too much of a ‘Woe is me’ rant and so I’m starting again determined not to sound so very melancholy. As you know I can slip that way too easily. Of course there is change. The only thing that doesn’t change is that there is change, but it doesn’t have to be bleak or somber.
Of course you may have guessed I am talking about parting with the stage and possibly the lorry in order to pursue a quieter and less energetic way of life. I have had many kind and well-meaning folk wish me a happy retirement and perhaps you can imagine my reaction to that. Of course if you really love your life as I do, then you never want it to end, but changes have to be made as age dictates that doing the same things, like balancing on three chairs juggling knives, becomes a little more challenging. Note I didn’t say impossible. A part of me loves the idea of having little else to do but work in a garden and walk by the sea with Hilary, the other nagging part of me still wants to carry on doing what I have always done. Perhaps there’s a middle way. Let’s walk down that road…
Ordering my thoughts has been especially difficult with the pills I have been taking for my minor heart ailment. They seem not just to block the betas, but just about any imaginative thought I have. I have never felt so dull as recently. So much so that I’ve stopped taking them for the last few days (with medical permission) with no apparent reaction apart for the clearing of a foggy brain. In any case the blood pressure and heart rate tests at the doctor this week showed perfect readings all round, and blood tests normal, so I will stay off them and work my way to stopping the others too. I need to be clear headed.
Since I last wrote we have completed about half of the filming for the indie drama film Simon Brannthorpe (https://www.simonbrannthorpe.com/) is directing about some dimensions of my life. It’s a drama in which I play three characters, all me. It’s set in the lorry. So for two weeks four males and a lot of camera and lighting equipment were shoehorned into the lorry living space for the first phase of shooting. It was a fascinating but rather claustrophobic experience, especially as the characters’ emotions are very near the surface. I learned a lot about the art of film acting, which isn’t acting at all, but a mixture of thinking and being. It was a fascinating process of discovery and one which I wish I’d had earlier in life. Simon is a perfectionist and a stickler for quality, like me, so we did many takes as the detail of the piece emerged. I haven’t seen any of it yet, but Simon seems pleased with most of it (when are perfectionists ever really pleased?). I will keep you informed.
But back to the nub. What a lovely word. There follows my thinking out loud about the changes I need to go through. The amount of work in setting up and taking down the stage on top of all I do in the show is proving tough but giving up and stopping isn’t an option. In any case the stage would sell much better as a going concern. And if I just stop I would go mad. So, a gentle rallentando. It’s worth trying.
I’m going to carry on doing the occasional show until someone emerges who might take it on. I’ll let that decide. It might be a long process, but there’s been interest. It’s a big commitment for whoever it will be so it’s going to take time. And another learned (or maybe reminded) lesson of the pandemic is that the best things take time. It’s in the same lesson plan as ‘Practice makes progress’ and ‘The best things in life are hard’.
The lockdown has also reminded us of the importance of families and friends. I have been helping Hilary with looking after Mimi and Blue, still alive but much older and more frail, still loving their lives, spoiled with love, proper food, two walks a day and all attention they could ask. It’s a privilege giving them a comfortable retirement from showbusiness, after all they’ve done. As for me, I’ve been overwhelmed by the kindness of all my family who have, over the years, put up with me away, travelling the roads pedalling magic and mayhem. As always they have been there for me.
So all in all things are not too bad and certainly they could be a lot worse. To rephrase that positively, things are good and have every possibility of getting a lot better.
Fo the rest of this year I have two confirmed bookings with perhaps more in the pipeline. I am at Batley Show in Shropshire on August 7th and at Lakefest (https://lakefest.co.uk/ )near Hereford with Sir Tom Jones from 12th – 15th August. It’d be great to see you there.
And then there’s 2022. I hope to be at a few of my favourite shows next year, fighting, free and fully fit, I say ‘hope’ because so much has changed we can none of us say for sure what any future may hold. I may not be balancing on three chairs but as you know I love a bit of drama and close up magic so how could I just stop and retire? And when someone does take the stage then I dare say I will be around, somewhere amongst you all, cheering them on and putting a Chinese or an Italian in their hat. (If you don’t follow that allusion you’ll have to read back in the history of these chapters!)
All the best from a road near you,
Mr Alexander