
I try something different on a trip home to Bristol. I sit down at an empty table and leave it to chance as to whether anyone will join me. Not long after sitting down, a man wearing a leather cowboy hat walks past.
“Do you mind if I sit here?” he asks.
“Not at all,” I say.
He puts the hat on the luggage rack and takes out a large Packard Bell computer. I make a comment about the size of the thing and ask what he does.
“I used to do website design but it became monotonous. I live and work in Glastonbury. Most of them are luddites, so they can’t afford a website.”
“Could they build their own?” I ask.
“No, they’re 30 years behind.”
“So, sorry, what do you do?” I ask again.
“I design 3D environments…Like Ringworld,” he explains. I stare at him blankly.
He shows me his screen. There’s a virtual image of a grassy landscape. He flicks through some more images. I think I get the idea.
“Hopefully, fingers crossed, touch formica, I’ll have an interview with 422 this week,” he says.
“What’s 422 ?” I ask.
“You know when you watch a programme like Horizon and you get a digitally created image of what they think the temple/fort/ship they’ve uncovered would have looked like?”
“Yep.”
“That’s what they do.”
“So you’re a freelance 3D Environment Designer?”
“Yes.”
“And what was your last job?
He pauses for a second, then says, “it was for EDF Energy. They were putting up windmills in Rutland. Part of the process of putting them up involved public consultations. They wanted to produce a virtual image of what the landscape would look like once the windmills were up. People could type in their postcode and see a computer generated image of where the nearest windmill would be. So if you saw a windmill planned for right in your back garden, you could point it out to them.”
“How were you involved?” I ask.
“Well the landscapes were real images, I had real digital terrain maps and real photographs – it was just a case of matching it all up. Just editing reality a bit.”
“And what do 422 want?”
“The 422 guys want real guesswork – I think they’re working on something at the moment that’s like; if you removed all the ocean in the world what would it look like? And if you think about it, the Mid-Atlantic Ridge would make the Grand Canyon look like a little trough.”
I notice a tattoo on his arm, “what’s that?” I ask.
“It’s the seven-antlered stag. It comes from the Mabinogion (eleven ancient Welsh romances). The line is ‘I am a stag of seven tines.’* The Welsh is the closest we’ve got to what we’re all thinking now.”
“What do you mean?” I ask.
“The Welsh folklore is the oldest in the UK and what connects us most to our original spiritual thinking.”
“You definitely are from Glastonbury,” I say.
“This is me unfluffy – you should see me when I’m fluffy,” he says, “and I’m from London, not Glastonbury – but I came to a small festival 23 years ago and I haven’t left.”
“Ah, so as a resident you get in free?”
“I haven’t paid for a Glastonbury ticket in 23 years – but not because I live in Glastonbury, it’s only a small radius around the site that qualifies people for resident’s tickets. I get in free because I’m one of a crew of about twenty to thirty running backstage passes in the circus area. Glastonbury Festival is the most nepotistic environment.”
I consider asking if he can get me in backstage but can’t think what circus act I would perform to justify it. We talk a little about where he lives – in a cottage off a main street, where Google Street View’s tentacles do not reach. And he has a girlfriend, ‘whose brother is a wizard.’
“A wizard?”
“Yes, one day I’m going to watch all the films he gets his quotes from,” he laughs, “he hates me though.”
“Why?”
“Oh I dunno, he’s Italian and I’m going out with his sister.”
At this point, two people come and join us on the table. And I think both of us know the looks we’ll get if we continue talking about Italian wizards. So I look out the window and make a comment about the beautiful autumnal colours lining the railway just before Bath. He calls me a hippy.
* On looking this up it appears to be from the Song of Amergin, translated by Robert Graves in The White Goddess.
Really enjoyed this post. Just goes to prove that I’m right and my friend is wrong. She says I have the all-people-are-fascinating thing and she has the all-people-are-a******s thing. Fascinating.
Anne
Thank you! Perhaps your friend should try talking to strangers on trains. I’d say some people are the former and some sometimes the latter ; )
Sophie
Wow!! I remember our meeting on the train so well.
Well I got the job with 422 for a year, now work frerlance all over the place. I got married last year and things are looking good.
Lovely to find this blog after so long.
Take care.
Wonderful! You’ve brought a smile to my face. 🙂 You take care too – and congratulations!