Galashiels

Saturday 7am

My God, Galashiels is rough. The people are rough, grey, dusty and uncared for just like the buildings. Okay like an airport at six in the morning, sitting in a pub midweek lunchtime is not going to give you a balanced view of things, but I am looking at a bleak future here. And it is not me being snobbish, it is really like this. I am too happy for those around me, I usually am, but then I am on holiday. The barman almost broke a smile but it was hard work. A lot people can hardly stand without leaning against something. They manage to stagger as far as the bar, feet hardly lifting off the floor, slumped tired posture, they look small and deflated like left over balloons a few days after a party, but of course there never was a party, the invites went out but it just didn't happen. It is like a parasite is slowly sucking the life out of them until you just die. Younger folk have that wary aggression that reminds me of the wildness you can see in baby animals before we tame them. For "tame them" read "break them", suck out their spirit until they have no fight left and slowly go mad staring at the bars and only dreaming of what might have been. When we mentioned we were emigrating we heard it all the time - " we thought about doing that " people would say, but for some reason or other did not. It was nothing to do with the reasons, it was that they could not escape from that clinging lethargy surrounding us, conformity is everything. I have escaped, and there is no way you are going to get me back.