Screaming at the sun

The eclipse shenanigans have delighted me.

Videos from gatherings across Europe show crowds noisily erupting at the moment of totality, voices hoarse as they push them towards the sky.

Do they cheer for the sun or the moon? I’m team moon all the way and would have liked her to stay there in front of her bigger, hotter brother for a lot longer if the resulting tidal disruption wouldn’t prove too severe.

As mentioned here before, I’m done with sun. I’m so done with sun, I’m writing a book about it (among other things).

Not a climate crisis book, as such, but it’s hard to see how contemporary fiction could leave it out when everything burns around us. Maybe I’ll give up and set it in the past so I don’t have to think about it too hard.

I rinse and recycle another ham packet and go back to my desk.

But the sun screaming on those clips - what is it an expression of? Togetherness? Why that moment when the black disc covers the yellow and we’re all, temporarily, in the dark? What were they trying to say to the sky? Hello universe, I’m down here. Wave back if you can see me.

Recently I was talking to a friend about another friend when it occurred to me: a lot of us are the children of a narcissistic parent. We have this constant need to be seen because we never were by them.

Was the screaming an attempt to be seen by the cosmos? By creation itself.

Don’t forget me down here.

I know I’m not alone in loving that feeling of unity when millions of people are all looking at the same thing at the same time.

It’s that feeling that drew me so strongly to television as a child, the primal campfire replaced by a glowing box of stories with the power to draw every eyeball to the glowing screen in the corner of the room.

Did you ever read The Demon Headmaster books by Gillian Cross as a child? The sinister head of an English school mesmerises his students with hypnotic eyes and makes them do his bidding. Then the school quiz team qualifies for a TV competition and the demon head uses his moment of fame to attempt to mesmerise the whole nation through their televisions.

You can tell how long ago it was written because it needs the conceit that every single person in Britain would be watching a teatime quiz show at the same time.

Side note: the story came true in the most awful way. A documentary called Look Into My Eyes tells the tale of a head teacher in Florida who used hypnosis on some of his students, three of whom died not long afterwards. It’s just gone up on ITVX if you don’t believe me.

Evil educators aside, I really miss television as it was back then, our campfire, the place we gathered.

They’re holding the Clacton by-election today. It’s a straight race between a wealthy fascist in pink trousers and a man in a bin. I’ve done Count Binface’s radio show a couple of times and found him to be a lovely man, kind and empathetic and as smart as a pin. Clacton could do a lot worse, but I expect they’ll return the hedge fund headbanger without much thought.

I’m back to the people screaming at the sun and thinking, I don’t blame them. Before, I would have said it was just the delight of revellers with a common cause but, after this hell summer, I’d saysome of the screams were more like something out of a horror movie.

Aerial photos of a TV actress’ mansion show that her lawns are looking suspiciously green, despite a widespread hosepipe ban. The article ponders wryly if the lush effect on several acres of her land was achieved by watering can. Hose shamed in the national press.

We sat out last night after the sun had attained full rotundity again and sunk away til morning and I looked at the little patch of grass we call a garden. It’s about 5ft by 8ft, a row of scabby cat mint running down one side. The ground thirsts desperately. I took a watering can and gave a splosh to my three favourite plants, willing them to stay alive a bit longer.

There’s rain coming next week, I promise them.

I go back to my desk and search for Edinburgh flats again. Or maybe we can stay in London from September to April and spend the rest of the year looking after a Scottish castle for some millionaires who would rather summer where it’s hotter.

If you know any members of the landed gentry who need a cat-sitter up that way, drop me a line. Nothing south of Hadrian’s Wall, thank you.