Michael and the Chink in the Wall

Michael and the Chink in the Wall ©

By Michael Casey

Michael was all alone in the house, he was abandoned, left all alone with just the mice for company. He was the kitchen boy in the Master’s house, he’d fetch and carry and be allowed to sleep in a corner, just like a dog, but a dog would at least have a basket. He was actually the Master’s son, but when the pantry maid had died in labour, Michael was kept in the kitchen, the Master agreeing not to send him to the Workhouse, a promise he kept as the maid died before him.

Being the eldest, Michael should have inherited the house and the fortune, but he had been born on the wrong side of the blanket. The non bastard children were in fact very ugly, but the Master had married for a fortune, and not for love. Meanwhile Michael slowly rotted in the kitchen, while snotty noses enjoyed their Victorian life.

Michael would sit and dream on the cold flagstones, just shadows on the wall for company. Sometimes one of Charles Dickens’  stories would appear wrapped up with carrots or turnips. Michael loved Charles Dickens his stories were so good, what with the cliff-hangers, one day Charles Dickens would be famous. The cook just laughed, but she enjoyed listening to Michael reading out the stories while peeled the spuds. That was the only reason she had taught Michael to read, so she could entertain her, she had in fact invented Radio, minus the radio that is, Listen with Mother if you like.  

Every night the staff went to the attic to sleep while Michael shivered in a corner, it was a slow death of the spirit apart from Charles Dickens. Michael had to try and fall asleep before the kitchen fire went out, or he would not sleep at all, the cold being so bone chillingly cold.

There was a chink in the wall from the house next door and this was Michael’s tv, without the tv that is. For in the next house everybody was always happy and gay, the servants laughed and even danced. They had a good Master, their fire was always on, the Master liked a warm house, he had made his fortune in India so he liked a warm house.

If Michael squeezed himself against the chink in the wall he could hear the singing and smell the cooking, he could pretend he was with them in the warmth of company and of real warm. There was  actually a bit of heat coming from that chink in the wall, Michael loved that house and that kitchen, it was so full of life and joy.

At night Michael fell asleep mumbling the songs that he’d heard from the next door household. In the middle of the night he’d regularly awake, his toes numb with cold, his bum freezing too. So he’d get up and stamp around. Only shadows for company, the one candle in a jar his only illumination. Michael would hold the jar and press it against his body for warmth.

Even the shadows on the wall had pity on him, they would dance about and form faces of people dancing and talking, trying to amuse and console Michael. The very stones cried for him, shadows of tears fell. Michael loved their company in his daily Dark Night of the Soul, a shadow is great company if you have no friends, if you have to decide whether to burn Charles Dickens for warmth or save him so he can warm your soul. Such a choice, warmth of the spirit or warmth of the body.

The same shadows came night after night, they were in fact peopled by stories from Charles Dickens, if your body is so cold, then all that is left is the spark of soul. Or distant smells and laughter coming through the chink in the wall. So your imagination sees things in the dark, you see what you want to see in the cold and dark. You see Hope. You see Love. You see Laughter. You see dancing shadows.

The cook gave Michael a sweet, it was covered in muck and feathers, she’d found it in the street when she’d been to the butchers, a few weeks previously. She had only just remembered it. It was a present for being such a good boy. It was also a goodbye, Michael would be 9 next week so the Master had decided to let Michael find his own way in the world. Michael would have to leave.

The Master was going to buy a puppy for his legitimate children, Alpha the dog would need a space in the kitchen, Michael would have to leave to make room for Alpha the dog. A dog is a man’s, a Master’s best friend after all. The promise to the pantry maid had been kept, 9 years Michael had squatted, now he was man enough to find his own way in the world.

The Master ordered that Michael be locked in overnight and then in the morning when Alpha arrived Michael would be shown the door. Michael stuffed all the Charles Dickens in his pockets, he’s freeze one last night, but Charles Dickens would be part of his new life whatever and wherever that may be.

The walls wept, if only Michael could squeeze through the crack in the wall, if only he could sing and dance with the neighbours, they were having a Christmas Eve celebration. Michael fell asleep dreaming that very same dream. He was dancing and drinking punch, the maids all gave him a dance and a peck on the cheek. They all loved him, he was not the bastard son, unwanted and thrown out to make room for a  dog.

Michael danced and laughed all night long, he was so happy, a much loved member of the family. He was smiling in his sleep, clutching Charles Dickens in his hands. That was how they found him in the morning, curled up like a dog, but with a smile on his face, and Charles Dickens’ new story in his hand A Christmas Carol. Michael had died happy in his sleep. But how he got next door through a locked door nobody would ever know, not even the stones would tell. Sometimes all the love you need is a chink in the wall.

Political Interviews

Political Interviews ©

By Michael Casey

Thank you for coming Candidate A, now as we have been called biased in the past the Press have decided to do things differently this time around. So please put your blindfold on and I will then enter the room, also in a blindfold, so we both have unbiased opinions. No gender or race preconditions.

You could hate my cologne or the sound of my voice.

True, we could have done this by radio too, or Radio Four if we were in England.

So hello and it’s an honour to meet you, in this fine country of yours, where exactly are we, my limo has such dark windows and my shades are darker than that guy who plays keyboards, you know the dead guy.

I’m a Classical music aficionado myself, they are all dead, and none wore shades, though Mozart could have done anything. So shall we begin the interview?

Sure Mam, but don’t we shake hands first?

Its Ms, I am as good as any Man, so call me Ms.

It you whistle I’ll come forward and shake hands Mam, sorry I mean Ms.

My name is John, if I’m allowed to reveal that much.

I’m Margaret, named after the English PM.

The interviewer and Candidate A move forward and stumble into each other.

My you are a pretty woman.

And you are so strong, your hands are so soft yet strong.

I aim to please.

Can you now remove your clothes and get into the bed to your right, my left. This is an interview for Naked Politics after all. Every political avenue had to be explored.

The things I do to get elected.

This should be pleasurable too. I am an experienced political interviewer. I did PPE at University in Cambridge, a few years ago.

New England is so beautiful, especially in the Fall.

Cambridge England, not in USA, I have lost my accent but I am from England, a little place called Old Forge and Singing Anvil.

Shall we start?

Ok, can you tell me Candidate A what are your policies on Global Warming?

It’s cold in this room can we at least cuddle a bit first?

Let’s huddle and cuddle, but keep that blindfold on.

So using foreplay as a metaphor Candidate A explained how things slowly hotted up before anything happened then there would be an explosion of warmth which could not be stopped, the genie would be out the bottle and twin peaks would wobble and melt. It might be nice being hot and warm all over but, there would be a price to play. That price was not a sea of love but a rising sea, which would sink low lying lands.

That was a good metaphor, but I’d like more if I may.

Candidate A reached out, this time he had a slap high and low and in between. You always have to be invited, even if you were blindfolded and naked in bed, with a Political Interviewer. Walter Cronkite had never dreamt of such things, some politicians in the 60s may have done them but we never knew at the time.

Now what are your views on the unemployed? The homeless and so forth.

So Candidate A examined her nooks and crannies, especially the nooks, but he was great with the crannies too, she felt the full weight of his nooks and crannies against hers. It was a hard life being a Politician and as for a Political Interviewer, you always had to go the extra mile, to tough it out and go the very edge where you were left breathless, but inspired as you perspired. You may not get a Pulitzer but the warm glow inside was worth all the toing and froing, it left you breathless, but your audience deserved it.

That’s the best explanation I’ve ever heard, said the interviewer.

I do my best to explain things, I hope I’ve proved I do give more than a toss for the homeless and the unemployed.

My final question as you have several more interviews to do, my final question is, what’s your policy on defence. A hot button topic, as you will agree.

I think we should always defend what’s ours and defend our friends, that’s what friends are for. If I may explain further.

So Candidate A using the political interviewer’s body as a map of the world, he explained defensive positions, and open positions, attacks from on high and attacks from below. Not to mention slow creeping attacks, and sudden nuclear attacks which could lay you waste. The Political Interviewer replied in kind with attacks and counter attacks and counter arguments. They were more than a match for each other, the blindfolds nearly slipped off such was the heat and sweat pouring from them, it was if they were fighting in some steamy jungle.

Well it’s been an honour to meet you, what’s your views on pornography? The candidate did not know what to say. The Interviewer asked him to remove his mask as she removed her wig to real her red hair. They had been filmed by 10 cameras, live streamed to the internet.

My political career is over.

It was the only way I could grab time with you, you are my husband after all.

John look at his wife naked on the king size bed, beside him.

Screw the election, let’s try for the 7^th time.

So they did, and John, or Big John as he became known in Election circles, won by a landslide. As the electorate want to see a real man who really loves his wife, and not machine with speech writers. And John was a real man, as the whole of the internet could confess, and if he was a machine, it was a sex machine.  

   

Advertising Campaign

Advertising Campaign ©

By Michael Casey

We’ve got to get the message out, the whole world must know, not just everybody in our house, but the entire world. We want to scream and shout and let all the world know about it. It must be the best advertising campaign ever. We can do it, we have to do it, it’s so important, we want the whole world to sit up and take notice.

If we tell George and Brownie for starters then the whole of Old Forge and Singing Anvil will know in a matter of hours, they are the biggest gossips in the world, or Old Forge and Singing Anvil at any rate. Then if we tell Clarence, no not the cross eyed lion, you fool, you know Clarence who drives the No.11 bus. His route is 22miles all around Birmingham, he’s so talkative he does 5 or is it 7 circuits a shift, so that’s all of Birmingham covered in a day.

Then there’s Mandy the local call girl, no I don’t mean lady of the night either, I mean Mandy is a call girl, not a call girl stupid. She calls out the numbers at the bingo. That’s all the OAPs covered, and those students who come for the cheap beer. So if they know you’ve covered two major demo demo demo catholics, or whatever is that fancy word for groups of people. Oh you mean idle bastards with nothing else to do except play bingo. Only joking, I don’t want to be attacked by a slow motion hit man, nor  a spotty  student with issues, or is it selling the big issue.

So we have all of Old Forge and Singing Anvil covered plus a ring around Birmingham with the no.11 bus route. It’s not Colgate we are advertising is it, the ring of confidence and so on? Now if we ask Big Sid in the butchers to take a leaflet or two then we’d cover all the meat eaters, and all his girls cover 3 generations of customers, so the coverage will be huge. Almost as big as Big Sid himself.

Then is we asked Percy the Undertaker to mention it, have a few leaflets to spread about the crematorium. Percy could even write a poem for our campaign too, he’s not just an undertaker but also a poet. Then we could get Patrick to draw cartoons on the wall, he’s not as good as Banksy but always very colourful.

That’s all sorted then, Andy can run around delivering leaflets, or drive around in the hearse delivering them. If there are any left overs he can just throw they from the hearse as he drives, like confetti at a wedding, leaflets everywhere.

And what are we advertising, on walls and floors and at funerals too, oh I forgot to tell you, its and anti-litter campaign.

Internet Story

something from years ago

Michael  Casey

Email michaelgcasey@hotmail.com

http://butcherbakerundertaker.blogspot.co.uk/

www.michaelgcasey.wordpress.com

http://www.michaelgcasey.typepad.com/

                  Internet Story ©

                       By

                   Michael Casey

So all I had to do was send an email, and then I’d be a writer, my book in every shop, my face smirking from cardboard cut outs of me holding my book aloft. My book had a great title, so it was bound to sell. A Nation Of Shopkeepers was a great title, if only people could remember their History, were people interested in History, and for that matter my book. It wasn’t a history book, would people think it WAS a history book, and then not buy it. It was a comedy drama, about a street of shops, interconnecting short stories, for all the family, but would people notice the levels, the strands of humour, or would they say it’s a Ma & Pa book, and miss the joke, just as one publisher called  did?

I decided to keep the title, though I had a reserve title, The Butcher, The Baker and The Undertaker. Then I realised the US market would rename it The Butcher, The Baker And The Funeral Arranger. You don’t think about such things when you are writing the book, you’re just happy, on a roll, in love with your own intellect, or just surprised you actually DO have any intellect, then you discover that you are dyslexic, you really are dyslexic, thankfully not a really bad case, just dyslexic. As you proof read you see you have put BUT instead PUT, LEAD instead of READ, things like this and other strange things. Sure there are spellcheckers but or is it put, you have to check it anyway. As you read you are surprised at your own ability. You didn’t waste 4years in journalism school, but your writing is GOOD, Did I write that? Then your chest filled with pride you get somebody else to read it, and guess what? They think its crap. So now you have to decide, should I give up or should I carry on?

I gave up for as while, while is a unit of years in my  case, my life took another path, so the writing was forgotten, it lay dormant for years, then like a phoenix it arose, or more truthfully, like a tortoise awaking from hibernation, sleep still in my eyes I slowly poked my head out, then back in, went back to sleep again, then finally with the pangs of hunger in my stomach I just had to do something. In my case it was eat, as in really eat, then I turned to my old Atari and realised it was not PC compatible, so I bought a new, or rather an old new Atari which was PC compatible. Then I spent a day copying my files so that I could read them on a PC. Then I wrote a few more pieces before I realised I’d get nowhere in England. The chances of being published were 1 in 2000. So like a bear, I went back in my cave and slumbered.

Meeting my wife Jing Jie was a turning point in my life, and not just because it was like Thunder as Jing Jie calls it, it was a turning point because I had a professional opinion on my writing, from a journalist at the very top of the tree. Her uncle is an editor in chief, so his comments were and are like gold, worth more than my first coffee and Cadbury’s chocolate, the pleasure rush I treat myself to every day, his comments really were that important to me, and I really DO like my Cadbury’s, so being better than Cadbury’s is the highest praise I can give. So I knew the quality of my writing, even if others said and say its crap.

Getting a modern PC and internet connection was another turning point. Email in our house is like water and eclectic in any other homes. Jing Jie can “talk” to her mum in Shanghai every day. To friends all over the world as well. Birmingham IS the centre of the universe.So with hope and fear I had to transfer my files from my old Atari to the new PC. The floppy discs were  old and battered, several were unreadable, finally my work, my babies were safely on the new PC. Just to be on the safe side I set up a web site, so now my work was on somebody’s server in the US, thousands of miles away , safe from fire or theft. I could also put our new baby’s photos on the web site so that my Chinese family in Shanghai and Miami and friends all over the world could see Annie and Jing Jie and me, they could even read my work too.

So now all I had to do was market my work in the US, simple really, soon I’d be doing something useful with my life, making people laugh. I’d be a writing whore, I’d get paid to make others laugh, the best job in the world. So how would I set about it? I got a list of radio stations from the internet and started sending emails galore. I’m talking in the hundreds now, to radio stations the length and breath of the US.They could publicise my site then eventually I’d get published, or my play would get produced. It was simple wasn’t it. So merrily I went about my business, sending emails galore. Years before I used to send off big heavy envelopes with my work in, with more persistence than hope in my heart.”Thank you for your pieces of paper“was the best put down. I once even met a writer and he agreed to to read my play Shoplife, then he wrote back calling me a plagerist, because it was so good. So I used his note as toilet paper, Shoplife was so good because I had 20years of experience given to me by my sister, I just improved on it, but yet I was called a Copyist, so naturally I was angry and used his note to wipe my bum.

I wondered why my strike rate was so low with my emails to radio stations, then somebody casually mentioned, “You do know they will just delete anything with an attachment”. In these days of viruses or worms which I’ve discovered is the new trendy word, nobody can risk their PC, so I merrily send and they merrily delete. I’d been wasting my time, but not my money because I’d got a 24/7 package on my internet from AOL.However one radio station did read Shoplife. The DJ or is it Host, he called it hilarious and he could not stop reading it. It turned out he was an actor as well, though isn’t everybody an actor in the US?

So I thanked him, and quoted him in my future advertising.Humour is a funny thing. The things that make English people laugh are not the same as the things that make Americans’ laugh. We are constantly told by people on tv that English TV is the best in the world, the US material we see is the top 10%, the rest is rubbish. But I know I’d never get my foot in the door in England so I had to persist with my American campaign, so now I pasted in my material, no attachments. Just get them hooked, then paste in a sample then direct them to http://butcherbakerundertaker.blogspot.co.uk/ & www.michaelgcasey.wordpress.com

Then bingo part2 of my life could begin,I’d be the man that made America laugh, a naïve sentiment, but it was honest.Only AOL turns things into zip files and some people cann’t unzip your files, its like wanting sex but your zipper is broke and you cann’t get your trousers off. Such a strong urge, but no forfillment .

I switched to MSMAIL and pasted in my stuff, things started to happen, my files weren’t being deleted or too zipped up to be read. At least I wasn’t frustrated any more. Now I had an agent interested, and a new magazine, even a theatre replied.All praise to Bill Gates, and to a Christian called Pat Verato who pointed me in the direction of a few good sites.However some of the sites that I trawled through were just, so very American. Hey, you too can be a writer, just send me 10 dollars and I’ll send you my book “How to make 10 dollars” ,  and he does. Then there’s magazines you can subscribe to, yes you’ve guessed it, just send another 10 dollars “Writing for Beginners”. There’s all these agents too who are so successful, persuading tap dancing bus drivers to write about Tap Dancing For Bus Drivers, the complete self help book, costs 10 dollars. The agent gets 20percent, and the bus driver pays 5000dollars to print 500 copies, then he can boast he’s a writer, not just a bus driver, and guess what if you pay 10 dollars you can learn to tap dance too.

As for me, what do I think of all this? I’d say just keep on writing, stop your selling, or attempts at selling, just write a bit. Add to your catalogue of 3 poems and 2 short stories, then search for an agent. Believe you’ll never be published and then you won’t be disappointed. There is one final thing you can do though, just tell everybody to go to my site   www.michaelgcasey.wordpress.com  

http://butcherbakerundertaker.blogspot.co.uk/

And help find a publisher for my book, and then you’ve guessed it, just send me 10 dollars!

                      End

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Michael-Casey/e/B00571G0YC/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_54?qid=1373557050&sr=1-54 

to buy my 9 books on Amazon Kindle they also download to PC too.

The Witch is Back

The Witch is Back ©

The witch is back is what we say when mummy, my wife, comes back from her travels, either to the Aldi or Sainsburys or Korea Foods or the Chinese wholesalers. I spend a lifetime carrying carriers, she just jumps into her car and away she goes. Which is all very normal for a Birmingham/Shanghai family. That has now changed, why has it changed? Because of the invention of the hands free mobile, with free phone calls bundle.

The wife as I call her, it’s a reference to a former day and to Les Dawson school of comedy, the wife is a talker, she does work in sales and ecommerce after all. She spends her day talking to everybody here in Birmingham and to staff at the Peking office too. Peking was the name for the capital for those of you too young to remember, now we say Beijing, I  just thought I’d give you a quick History lesson.

Anyway the wife loves to talk, and we get the benefit of her wisdom as she drives hand free home to us. The orders and commands come thick and fast, along with the witch’s laugh, in English and in Shanghai dialect, don’t forget to vacuum, put my rice on, have you started your homework yet, has Totoro our cat, with the Japanese name, has Totoro done her business, and if she has then have we cleaned the litter tray. By the way Totoro can and will pee in the bath if she thinks the litter tray is not clean enough, she’ll even pooh in the bath too. She is an educated cat after all, she watches all the family use the bathroom, so she joins in, we are a family after all.

Back to the witch, she will phone 10 times a day to check up on us while she is picking vegetables or looking at fashion in the shops. The phone has free calls after all, so we have the benefit, or the curse of the calls. She’ll tell us she has bought some sea bass or any other weird fish, some are still alive when she brings them home, so we gather around for the requiem, luckily the fishmonger has tied claws together.

If you like it’s a verbal blog, a torrent of talk if you allow me to use cheap alliteration, as I said to my small daughter, a future writer, who uses alliteration writers, who cannot write. I just shouted that question to my small daughter, and she replied straight away, though she said it’s not true. Hang on I must answer the house phone again, I’m being asked to bring in the washing, but no mud of my feet, an impossible task from an invisible wife, made visible by her too many free phone calls.