Monday, August the 4th, 2014

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Weird Oranges

I went to the greengrocer's and bought a bag of weird oranges. I say bag, but it was really a net, spun from some kind of red synthetic fibre, fastened with a dinky metal clasp. The net contained, by my reckoning, half a dozen oranges. And weird they were, though my intention had been to buy blood oranges. I was persuaded by the patter of the greengrocer to take the weird ones instead. The curious thing about his patter was that, by the time I was a few yards along the street, clutching my net, on my way to the park, I was unable to recall a single word of it. Why was I carrying weird oranges instead of the blood oranges I had wanted? I had no idea, but nor did I seem able to retrace my steps. I hurried on towards the gates of the park as if impelled by a force outwith my perception.

Arriving at the park, I made my way to my usual bench anent the duckpond. The ducks looked forlorn and ill-tempered. I discovered that it was impossible to unfasten the clasp on the net with my bare hands. It was, as I said, dinky, about the size of say eight standard stationery staples impacted together laterally. I picked at it with my fingernails but could get no purchase. I then tried to tear a slit in the net itself. God knows what the fibres were made of. Whatever it was resisted my increasingly energetic attempts to rend it. I gave up when my fingers were red with bloody stripes and my hands were shaking.

My plan had been—oh, it hardly matters, does it?, now it was so plainly abortive. In any case, I reflected, as I sat on the bench panting from my exertions, my plan probably would not have succeeded anyway, since I had been coaxed into buying weird oranges instead of blood oranges, the latter being a crucial element in the plan. A teal—or it might have been a merganser—paddled to the edge of the duckpond and fixed me with a look of reproach. I spat on the ground, and kept on spitting, until I had exhausted my phlegm.

Then I went a-trudging, without aim or purpose, through the park and along the lane past the railway sidings, up into the hills, those damnable pointy hills. I left the net of weird oranges on the park bench, from which they were snaffled, before the day's end, by a wolf. It was a weird wolf, so at least there was some kind of neatness to what was otherwise a most jambly-jumbly day.