The Incomplete Tim Key by Tim Key

Author:Tim Key
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Canongate Books
Published: 2011-02-14T16:00:00+00:00

66 Of course, people of my parents’ generation (born in the ’40s) have very set views about the night. Once it is dark, they think, the idea is that you watch something starring John Nettles, make a drink involving hot water and granules and then creep upstairs, turning lights and other electrical appliances off along the way. There they will lie down next to each other, shut their eyes and remain, prone, for somewhere between ten and fifteen hours. There is another way. The younger, more enlightened generations understand that once the sun’s no longer on the scene, there is no need to feel compelled to chug back our Valium and keep a low profile. Au contraire. Some of the best incidents can occur under the cloak of darkness. If you have the spirit of adventure, or if you have a car, there is plenty to be done whilst the docile sheep of the community are curled up in their pitiful cradles, dreaming incoherent dreams. One time, in my late teens, I arranged to meet up with a girl, Imogen, and we walked across farmers’ fields until, hungry and shivering, we found a barn. Another time, unable to sleep, I turned my bedside lamp back on and read my book. It was by a remarkable writer called Colin Dann, a gentleman who wrote literature about the animals of Farthing Wood; a renegade team of nocturnal bastards who agreed not to instinctively eat each other, but instead to work as a team, to escape the wood and build a better life for themselves elsewhere. When you get your teeth into something like that it’s easy to see insomnia not as a curse but as a gift from the Gods. Other times, I’ve been awake at two o’clock in the morning at social occasions such as parties or initiation ceremonies. The point is, though it may seem easy to dismiss the night as a major inconvenience, a scary mess of owls and street crime, you should at least experiment with embracing it. My advice would be to drink a couple of Redbulls, haul on a Gortex jacket and stride into the night. Learn to love it. Work with it. And that’s not me giving the green light to criminal activity. If anything, that’s me giving the green light to sitting, stone-cold sober on a bench next to a village pond, eating a filthy kebab and contemplating what to do next with your life. Also – as a heads up – don’t read this section at night if you scare easy. One of the poems involves a severed head.

67 Port’s really quite amazing. When I first got into drinking it was usually port. Me and the guys would go thirds on a bottle of port and walk it down to the park. Then we’d sit on the swings and see it away. Useful to know, port is actually a stronger brew than your average wine – a couple of bottles of that stuff and you know about it.

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