"​​She leaned in to my collar and whispered. The pubs ambient hubbub intruded, so I focused closer to her murmuring." after M Knopfler


The vinyl LP turned and turned, from the high fidelity speakers the rhythmic cycling of the needles crackling underscored the songs melody.

The tubes rabbits ears were angled just so, but still the snow drifted into the black and white images of the broadcast. Its noise waltzing to and fro with the weekly show we had gathered to watch.

As the lights dimmed, the film rolled, lighting up the theatre with its striated light, shadows passing before our ever adjusting eyes. The analog films scratches revealing the passage of usage and time, overlaying the oeuvre with its own memories.

The patina of time had woven its stories, leaving its mask enmeshed in the smile of the elders face.

The couple bickered with each other, trying to remind the other of the facts of their common family story…

Embossed and printed paper was no longer secure enough.  Now the plastic had embedded strands and multiple overlapping layers of anti-counterfeit imagery and tokens.  No wonder the fifth estates' multiple news feeds were no longer trusted as purveyors of truth as well.

The advertisement promised the good life, one need only purchase this brand, and the future would arrive here, now.

Are the rubbings woven baskets, wompaum beads? Or possibly peg boards and mass produced floor mats? They drift into our consciousness, and slide sideways as these stories intermingle, creating songs we learn to recognize within their echos of each other.

Or is this just the vocabulary of advertising intruding into our daily lives.  A transit through competing messages, up to us to discern the relevant meanings?

Do we need noise to pick out the signal? Is juxtaposition our only means of seeing, of understanding?

 © GAMcCullough      2017