The Tableaux Of Drunkeness

This is a photograph that was taken in Manchester on New Year’s Eve. It was posted on Twitter, a tableaux of drunkeness that was said to capture well the city on that particular evening. It truly is a visual feast: everywhere you look, there’s something going on.

Manchester, in all her glorious mayhem.

We later learned that all’s well that ends well: the guy being restrained by the police officers was not arrested, and left the scene after calming down.

And the reclining guy in blue, (upstaging all others in his model-like pose while  commendingly not spilling a drop of his drink in the process), was later traced and said, maybe not surprisingly, that he had no recollection whatsoever of being there.

He almost looks photoshopped. Perhaps he believes that he was.

Inspired by the artistic merits of this scene, Twitter users impressively stepped up to the plate:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hope you enjoyed this cultural feast.

Art for art’s sake, to quote a certain Mancunian group.

Welcome to Manchester, 2015. Just.

The Fox In The Night

On the night of New Year’s Eve, before the celebrations began in earnest, I took the dog for a walk. The mind often wanders when outdoors, and I began to reflect on how, being on the cusp of 2015, I would, in the coming year, be turning forty four. With my attention turned inward, I started to think of all of the ways we, as a family, celebrated Christmas and New Year when I was a child. And, for the first time ever, I felt a sudden, brief, twinge of sadness. Sadness that I am moving still further away from my beginnings, and sadness that some of the loved ones who contributed to those happy memories have been left behind, some far behind.

It was only a fleeting emotion, for I am seldom morose and normally quite sanguine and accepting of the order of things. On life’s journey we all move on, but remain forever attached to our roots. It’s like we wander with a safety cord. Moving on to situations new, but with a stored, constantly developing, frame of reference.

As I walked in the darkness, connected by leash to my Golden Retriever, a fox suddenly shot out in front of us, paused to look back as though to confirm that we were not beginning a pursuit, and then continued on its way. I remembered reading somewhere, about animal symbolism, that in (I think) Chinese folklore, a sighting of a fox indicates a signal from the spirits of the deceased. In that respect, this would have been quite an expedient and timely sighting, wouldn’t it?  But, personally, I think it was just a local scavenger fleeing the sound of some premature fireworks. But, in fleeing, what the fox did do is jolt me out of the past and refocus me back in the present.

I continued along the way, still connected to the past, but acutely aware that I am now creating new memories for my own children to take away.

The year trembled upon the edge of extinction.

The Sun Sets On 2014, Manchester

 

 

Photograph by DJ Bates