Oxford Adventure

Oxford Adventure

News from Nowhere. Today was an odd kind of day. Marcos* has just fallen, it is bitterly cold but there was bright sunlight. And I had an attack, which began in the Kings Arms, when I was with Martin. I will very briefly explain what an attack is. It is a spontaneous psychedelic experience mixed with latent schizophrenia. When the psychedelic phenomena begin they summon up schizophrenic symptoms, including paranoia and ideas of reference. For the first few hours I find these attacks painful, if enjoyable. After about 3 hours of free-wheeling they become unbearable and if I do not have the antidote on me I have to go home and take some pills, which dispel the attack in about 3/4s of an hour. That very simply is an attack. I walk down the street like a snail without a shell. I had an enjoyable time during the benign phase being very receptive to all kinds of stimuli. Perhaps you could say I’m a free-lance lunatic. Well it started in the Pub and I thought to myself “Here we go”, when the face of the man I was talking to began to, or rather the skin, became slightly grotesque and every detail, protuberance and pore became slightly fluorescent. Melting salami. And the pattern on the table-top which had brown ripples on it began to seem too interesting. The man I was talking to had to mark an essay (he was a Don), so I absented myself and had to decide whether I’d have a little cybernetic holiday, or go straight back to my room and take some pills. I decided to take a cybernetic holiday courtesy of my neurotransmitters. It was a good day for it. Very sunny. What follows is a totally subjective account of what I saw and did.
  The crowds in the streets were panicking, they swarmed in droves averting their eyes from me, pretending to have urgent appointments to keep. They moved quickly. The Orientals or even any one from the third world had strange gleams in their eyes. They were celebrating the downfall of Marcos I suppose. I felt friendly towards the Orientals as I felt we had a subversive intent in common. And the patterns I saw (Psychedelic) became Oriental as well. (Sometimes in a suburban street Chinoiserie takes over.) Every now and then as I crossed the road or walked along the street I would stop turn round and walk back in the opposite direction. Keep them guessing that was my motto. The Bastards have kept me waiting for long enough, now it’s their turn to wait. You might have a one-man riot on your hands I said to the authorities. Call off the helicopters too or there’ll be trouble. The King’s Arms is on the corner of Holywell Street. My first port of call was Blackwell’s. Nothing too extreme happened in there, the attack had just started. No doubt the Watcher, opponents, collaborators, all the conspirators, of whatever colour, would be interested in what books I bought. But I wasn’t playing that easy to analyse, keep the Bastards guessing. So I didn’t buy any books and walked out of the shop. I started to walk down Broad Street towards Cornmarket. Ten steps on I swivelled round and returned to the shop. I walked in and immediately selected the two books whose titles and blurbs had intrigued me and went up to the counter. The girl said “How do you want to pay”, “Cash”, I said, “though I know it’s going out of fashion.” She smiled. I’ll wrap them for you, she said. The books were Long Talking Bad Conditions Blues, and For Love of Liberty. They seemed good, and somewhat experimental but not too way out. Then I turned left out of Blackwells and started walking towards Corn Market again. I had an encounter with four girls who I think I had passed before. I had a pretty inanely malicious grin on my face, which coupled with my wild look-five day beard, hair last washed in the last millennium but now looking rather biblical and distinguished like John the Baptist in Theorem (Pasolini). It gets a sort of wavy sculptural look in this state. Which coupled with….. my innocent diminutive build must have made me look like a prophet from the kindergarten. Anyway one girl looked back and giggled. All four looked back furtively, and grinned. I said “Ello Darlin”, and they looked at each other nervously and tittered off. All but one who stayed behind to look at a street map, or pretended to at least. Perhaps she wanted to get into conversation with me. But I wouldn’t be got that easy. Oh no! I stopped and looked across the road. She walked off to join her friends.
Christopher Baily
*[Marcos fell in February 1986]