Ramblings of a Disorientated Mind

When I was younger, I heard of the genre ‘indie’. I didn’t really know what it was, I vaguly knew it was short for ‘independent’, and while I’d not actually heard any of this ‘independent’ music, I’d seen the artists and for some unremembered reason, I decided I didn’t like them, their music or the way they dressed. I decided for some arbitrary reason that the Indie style was Bad.

And then I started listening to britpop, bands like Travis, Oasis, The Verve, Blur and Coldplay, and somehow that led me to bands like The Killers, The Cranberries and James and I decided I quite liked what they played. The style was in most cases subtly different from the mainstream and wildly different from my main staples of rock, folk and gothic.

So it came as a big supprise to me when wandering around LastFM looking at the tags of these artists that a lot of them said ‘indie’ next to them. Maybe I’ve grown musically, maybe I’ve just matured in my attitude to life, but I still find it faciating that I completly unknowingly came to like indie music through my own terms, and it still supprises me sometimes when I find something I like and it turns out to be indie.

☮&♥

A while back, in the book I carry with me, I wrote this:
‘People are so cool. None of these individuals know it, but each of of them is cool beyond belief. They walk along, the centre of their own little universes, and each thought they have, each belief, is unique. No one sees the world in exactly the same way, each thought is always slightly different from the person ahead’

I was thinking about the the other day, as I walked through Poole park. I still think the above is true, but a certain realization came to me. Even though each person views the collective world a slightly different way, I don’t think most people are unaware that they exist in their own little universe. People are monumentally selfish and don’t like being ousted from their universes.

I came to realise this by watching the people walking towards me, and watching their reactions to me. I’m trying to be a generally friendlier sort of person. To me, this means smiling, nodding or just saying ‘good morning/afternoon’. But, strangely, almost every person I nod to, or smile at or even just make genial eye contact with, acts with… well almost fear. Certainly suspicion or revulsion. Mostly I would put this down to current political and social climates of general distrust, and I understand it, but a part of me is really saddened by this, especially considering I live in this tiny seaside town where you’d expect people to be a little nicer to each other.

This leads me on to a few more observations, mainly that to heighten this idea of being trapped in one’s own universe, so many people I see in public places have some form of personal stereo. Every one, from business men to lone students, seem to have ear buds in their ears, blocking out the world. As well as this, on buses, no one looks at each other. Even friends or couples stop talking to each other when on public transport, and each turn away from each other and look out of a window. It seems to me that no one pays any attention to their surroundings any more. No one looks at each other, no one looks up or down or around themselves. Music is used to block out the world noise and we attach invisible blinkers to ourself to stop from seeing the world around us.

Personally, I don’t understand it. Maybe it’s being a writer, I’m given to looking around more. Maybe it’s Andy’s influence that leads me to be more observant. Whatever the reason for my heightened sense of awareness, I just don’t understand why people want to block out anything that doesn’t comply with their own personal universe. It’s this fact alone that leads me to believe that the world if full of selfish people, and I consider this fact to be a sad reflection of our times.

☮&♥