Doors no.1
Keys. Not really how it goes.
At Blackwall Beach, security surveys the building every hour after 6. My key is lost, he is such a smiley nice guy. There used to be a subsidised canteen here. The ladies would mother him and he would buy £1 bacon sandwiches. They slipped him a extra few rashers.
The old owner had wild curly hair, and rode a quad bike around London. Quite short, he could prove himself to be a real Alan Sugar behind closed doors.
I would just wait here in the communal space, without my key. It’s gorgeous. A seventh floor conservatory. Really crispy dry. Clouds overhead for when the real big decisions are being made. I got a missed call on my phone. But I called back to the wrong number. I accidentally called Lambeth Talking Therapies. It actually seemed a good way to call them in that moment and energy started ramping up. I let myself go and knew that just waiting here had been the right thing to do.
I innately knew this. The feeling of intuitive magic crept over me. Smiling i had an awkward chat to rearrange a further phone consultation with the lady from LTT. As an afterthought I did apologise at the end for the strange beginning of the call.
‘We hear it all’, she sounded tired but good humoured.
Couldn’t help myself but round it off like that, but i felt quite in control, which was cool. It felt OK. I guess it was this energy that was coming.
The energy started as a moving to and fro.
Earlier that morning I had made a decision to let all of the interactions I had that day unfold in their own time. Gently to look and speak to each person with appreciation. Not rushing the conversation to conclusion. Not making a joke out of everything. it’s only when i feel really insecure that I do that. Fall back to it. Laziness.
So, no key. Not that long after arriving, before waiting, I wandered. I found two people raising a wall covered in foliage. A restful chat followed in which I gained a phone charger. This was cool. This led to the aforementioned call. Soon to be returned to.
Prior to this, closer to the beginning, but after the morning, I arrived at the building. Signed in, talked about my lack of key, again (it was the sixth day of no key). I took the lift. Maybe it was even lift E, the favoured lift as it is made of glass. I attempted entry to the outer door with a woman. She was sat on the floor, stuck outside too. Asking to borrow my card she jimmied open the outer door effotrlessly. She was here to talk about moving into an empty studio space.
I took a lift back down at this point, after holding the outer door open with a fire extinguisher. Now the security guard wasn’t sure how to help. Intermittently his mind searched, whilst chatting. This may be the point, or have been the point, where the energy ramped up. or maybe it was the jimmying of the lock, or the fire extinguisher. The guard sent me to the building manager.
This was an odd little breather, a chance for everyone to look away. The building manager had a little look, non committal he provided an excellent platform for the security guard to bounce off. Understandably uninvested. He was chill.
With nothing left to do at this moment and after this break, I went upstairs, to wait. For something. The first thing being the phone call. After the charger. Or, yes, after the charger. At this point I became aware in the moment of the magic happening. The air was all hovering and wobbling and humming. The air was also completely void of anything. Partly because of air conditioning. I had a look at the clouds overhead that helped people to fire other people in the past.
So, I am halfway through the phone call with Lambeth Talking Therapies. I hear the door to my right open and close. I am pretty into the phone call and don’t see who comes in. A hand reaches out in front of me. Holding a key.
‘What!?” I say with key eyes.
“Uh huh,” nods security guard.
“Of course,” i think, Hang up.
Compose myself slightly, I mean, very slightly I am not very adept at composure. I know there is something really happening now though. So I ready myself.
Security guard holds out a list to me. Small, hand written, with four colums: Room-Number-Room-Number.
“I remembered that this very room you are trying to get into used to be a HR department. There were keys kept for it, it needed to be locked properly because of all of the personal information in there. When I check round the building, I remember seeing this cupboard in an empty office filled with all old keys.
I thought, if I find out the number for your keys, from this..’, he motions with the list. He is so smiley and he gesticulates in a very likeable way. Like a stand up comedian from an indie radio show. Except, you can see his gesticulation. I don’t do him justice.
‘…I could maybe find your keys. The keys were just all over the place, bunches all together in there.’ he washes his hand around low down to show that all the keys were in the bottom of the cupboard. I assumed they had fallen of hooks, or been thrown there whilst someone was looking for some other keys.
‘But, I had a bit of a look. Found four keys! You have one of them, make it yours.’
BAAAMMMMMMM, clickety click. Our brains synced up. He tells stories in the way that my brain swallows them up whole. I have a key, cool! But this was a bit more. I think. If I were to use a thin metaphor here a key in a lock might work. Is that a metaphor?
He is the best, I’m thinking as he leave.
‘My good deed for the day.’, as he closes the outer door behind him. Removing the fire extinguisher.
I return the charger to the couple with the wall. I tell them, there is a cupboard in the building, with lots of keys, and a guy who may be able to help you find your key too! They are very vibey people and they take it in a relaxed way, they aren’t going to push it, i can tell. And plus, that energy has dissipated now. It rounded it all of nicely though, sharing it a bit further. Oh, then I clip the key onto my keyring.
Doors no.2
Balls, light dances past.
Old yellow bulbs, holding hands.
Reflecting on the carriage windows.
Sky in deep blue, the lights now reflect off of her neat glasses.
Hands folded in her lap,thick
straps of a waitrose bag
entangle there.
Deep comfort gives way to pure ecstatic wonder.
Doors slide open, revealing
a mystical landscape.
A low wall, hedgerow and bushes, and a spot ilt platform.
Only sightly in relief
it could be flat.
Hedges make way for the little wall.
Three bricks high it is made to look like faux dry stone walling.
Patiently
she steps out of the doors under a glass box,
lit, the words say ‘way out’.
Written in round leaden text.
Air raid siren script.
She steps away, lightly.
She steps away, like a nymph lightly.
She steps onto a floating orb of light.
That was floating along side the train,
following us here.
The orb bobs as she tap, tap,
steps lightly from one orb onto another.
Waitrose bag swinging,
composure so light.
She is a nymph, as she steps away, her mouth shut tight.
As a purse, into the night.
Doors No.3
Arthurian.
A crowd waits outside the glass doors. There is an ATM in there that will show me my bank balance etc. That is why I am here. Mostly the people waiting are probably 50 and above. My minds flits about a little bit, lightly fingering some clues. But it does feel a bit judgemental. Clues as to why they are waiting. Could be a late breakfast, a bargain, just eager to shop. They could just want to be first in line.
I am standing apart from everyone else. Closer the the flow of pedestrian traffic that zig-zags on walkways over a busy road. Why am I standing over here? Maybe I think I am better than these eager hopeful people. I really anxious about my bank balance. Not having online banking is a chore. Really feeling like an asshole today. So, I do that ‘thing’. Take myself away to a magical view on things. Instantly I am cynical of it. Who am I to think I can be magical? That guy over there is thinking about his real magical breakfast. Dreaming about the steam going up his nose, and how he will glow like a candle after he has finished eating.
I am really still as asshole.
There is movement around the doors. Ladies in super neat uniforms. They fuss in a purposeful way. Set up a cordon, take it down again. Following a procedure not needed in this occasion. My belly jolts forwards. butterflies. Murmurs rise out of the small crowd. They shift a little closer.
One door, the top is unlocked, then the next and the next. All the tops of the doors are unlocked. The potential for opening is getting a bit unbearable. So I look away, quite ashamed of myself.
On swift movement, the doors are opened, the small crowd surges forward. I am following up the rear. But i walk way faster than everyone else. I can’t help this propulsion. It is a habit from wanting to be strong and safe.
People turn off in all directions at the escalators. they go up and up to food, baby clothes, women;s casual, ‘younger’ women, means, home, stationary, books, children’s toys. There is another older mall connected to this department store by a method of half floors and escalators. It’s dizzying. An attempt to make sense of it is pointless, just let your brain glide.
My destination is one of those half floors, below ground levee. You have to perform a sort of back and forth, and you slip through somewhere to some corner. I’m not worried about finding it. My brain holds the journey pretty well, lightly framing it.
Pounding the marble I move down the first avenue between clothing concessions.
Every single brand has one or to women working the sales floor. Here it is, this was what all the waiting was for. Forget earlier cynicism and even my bank balance fades out.
Every single one of these women lines the avenue. Pale, pretty adorned trees. Equidistant, opposite each other, going on and on. Every single of these women smiles at me as I approach and then bows low. A Mexican wave of bowing. All the way down this avenue, turn a corner, the same, after the first escalator, more bowing, back on myself down the tiny escalator.
Leaving the procession I slip into the glass room with the ATM. I am totally glowing.
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