IN STRICTEST CONFIDENCE

Sometimes, when I’m feeling particularly low, or on the very brink of insanity, I get ideas in my head that immediately sound utterly ridiculous, but I persevere with them nevertheless. Like when I occasionally toy with the idea of doing some acting again. After all, I reason to myself, I used to quite enjoy doing a bit of the old board-treading at school, and occasionally I feel as if I need to find things that I enjoy doing when I’m feeling gloomy.

But then I try and practice, or at least think about the idea, by perhaps saying some words out loud when I’m in the car, they instantly just sound utterly ridiculous when it’s me that’s saying them, and I quickly put the idea back into its box until the next time I’m having a crisis or something.

Come to think of it, in my mind I know full well that those school performances were pretty embarrassing, too. Whilst my Jacob Marley (I know, typecasting at its very best) was generally well received, I know now that I could have done far more with those chains, those locks, those weights, and the mere thought of all that howling just makes me cringe in utter shame. (Heck… Even the programme cover design I did makes me want to weep nowadays…)

As for Franz the comedy Nazi butler in “The Sound of Music” let’s just recognize the fact that he once existed and then never speak of him again. I do like to think that the late Sam Kelly and I shared a similar disdain for public “Heils” however…

Also, rationally (if I can consider anything that I think nowadays to actually be rational…), I know that the last time I was persuaded to drag myself onto a stage to make up the numbers in a cough and a spit appearance in something so dreadful I dare not speak its name, I can nowadays only remember the massive pain-in-the-arsedness of having to turn up each day, remembering to shave, and the utter fear of not remembering the words.

And there were only about six of those dotted through the banal nonsense…

Standing there, with my knees quaking in the wings, knowing that word number one had vanished and taken all of its little word friends along with it, was just horrible, even when I knew that they were penciled in on the clipboard that my “character” (and I use the word loosely) carried.

Oh well, at least I didn’t have to hang about for the curtain call… Given what I was doing, that would have been an insult to everyone else involved, I always thought. Plus, of course, I could be home and in bed before the end of the interval, which is always a bonus when you live in the back of beyond.

So, my mind may occasionally drift off and consider thesping again, but the practical part of my brain knows that I can head upstairs to write a pithy phrase of my own only to forget it before the computer has had time to boot up, and that’s when I’m thinking of my own words. Remembering pages and pages of someone else’s would be nigh on impossible, especially this aging addled old cranium of mine.

And even in the unlikely event of me managing to remember them, there is, of course, the additional rubicon of then having to stand in front of people and say them out loud, preferably with some sort of performance sprinkled into the air around them.

Not a chance in hell of that happening, I suspect.

This public performance anxiety is, I fear, also why my scriptwriting pastime finally ground to a halt. It wasn't just the lack of self-confidence in what I was writing (although that played a huge part in it), but also the thought having to say my words out loud and in front of other people, especially people who might think that it was all utter rubbish.

I do consider joining a writing group again from time-to-time, if I could find one, but that whole crippling, crushing lack of self-confidence thing tortures me into submission and instead I do nothing, preferring instead to rattle out blogs like this in relative obscurity and anonymity.

You know, I once read somewhere that, in certain quarters, shyness is equated with selfishness. Well, all I can say in response to that is you just try living with it, matey…

Way, way back in the day, I used to quite enjoy performance poetry and occasionally toy with going along to some of that again.

Don’t get me wrong, I doubt that I could ever stand up and spout some of my own doggerel out loud in a public place, but I think that it might just occasionally be pleasant just to be amongst it again and hear some well-chosen words drifting across an enraptured room, although I would cringe in transferred embarrassment at the inevitable smartarse heckle and so probably wouldn’t enjoy it at all.

You see, a lot of the time, I’m not even suffering on my own behalf, but absorbing the blame and the shame for the entire room, presumably so that they don’t have to.

Lack of self-confidence… It really is a bit of a bugger, especially as “people” seem to think that I don’t suffer from it at all, especially as when, in the days when I did used to socialize, I was often the loudest idiot in the room.

I was trying to compensate for something I suppose… either that or the demon drink had a hold on me…

Even expressing opinions could leave me flustered and I really can't get across to anyone quite how much self-loathing can follow even the simplest of social interactions, and how much I would hate myself as I headed home after yet another evening of public embarrassment and humiliation.

I believe other people refer to such things as “parties…”

But then again, my artwork fizzled out in much the same way. Showing my “work” to people who might proclaim it to be utter garbage was more than I could bear, and that was before I ended up working for a guy whose entire modus operandi seemed to be to ridicule and belittle everyone who worked under him, for the betterment of the product, of course...

(I'm amazed sometimes that I manage to function at all any more, especially in the workplace...)

That was years ago now, but it’s left its mark on my stuttering soul.

In recent years, I’ve often felt like I have had a lack of encouragement, or someone to believe in whatever abilities I may or may not have had. I always wanted some kind of a mentor, but even then you have to persuade someone that you actually have some kind of ability for them to mentor you about, and that really isn’t possible when you don’t believe a word of it yourself.

It’s far too late now, anyway, but it still nibbles away at me from time-to-time, and I regret being such a bloody coward for letting those feelings of self-doubt and disbelief overwhelm all of those possibilities I once believed I once might have had.

So it looks as if I might have to try and find something new to enjoy doing, although, after all those years of searching, I really am beginning to wonder quite what it might actually turn out to be…