Stuck For Time

          On a bustling street in Naples, I saw a chap standing amidst the seething throng, having his nostril hair trimmed with an old-fashioned-looking clipper device. Was he the recipient of a service, like shoe-shining, for busy men-on-the-go who need to smarten up their appearance or primp some aspect of their personal grooming at the last minute? I couldn’t stop to check, as I was navigating the crowded pavement, trying not to lose sight of my Other Half, who was already some distance ahead and disappearing fast.

          Nevertheless, I was intrigued by the public execution of what I have always considered a private, bathroom-based procedure and, subsequently, recalled when I first became aware of the necessity for it. At the age of five or so, I watched with awe as my father wielded a small pair of scissors up his nostrils while making a funny face in the mirror. It was, perhaps, three decades later that I purchased my own, dedicated tool for the same purpose.

          I have never enquired whether this is a singularly male phenomenon, by the way, but one thing is for sure: it is a symptom of ageing. As the years go by, hair thins out on the scalp and sprouts more prolifically elsewhere, a bioprocess for which there must be a scientific explanation, if only I had time to seek it out. But the allocation of one’s time within a diminishing lifespan becomes more critical the closer one gets to its conclusion – which is one reason why I should have given up reading that last novel after chapter one.

          There were warning signs in both the title – There Is No Antimemetics Division – and the author’s name – qntm (sic) – that should have caused me to by-pass this work of fiction and opt instead for something more mainstream, but I was swayed by the opinion of a stranger (a published critic) and the nagging feeling that it was time to step out of my novel-reading comfort zone and try something unfamiliar while my mind is still sufficiently flexible to accommodate the shock of the new.

          Not that it’s a bad novel. It’s well written, has a plot and relatable characters. It’s just that I couldn’t grasp the premise of the story and that’s a problem that makes page-turning a bit of a chore. For those who might be intrigued, there is an explanation of sorts, halfway through: “If something can cross over from conceptual space into reality, taking physical form, then something can cross in the opposite direction “. If only that had been inserted into the first chapter, I might have made the decision to cut my losses and quit earlier but, by then, I had developed a dogged determination to get to the bottom of things. Besides, I had paid good money for the publication.  

          Not that I relish dwelling at length on the subject of aging, but the past few weeks have been somewhat loaded with incidents of friends and relatives coming face-to-face with the deterioration of physical health that comes with it. It does make one conscious that life and its pleasures – should one be fortunate enough to enjoy some – are time-limited and ought to be made the most of. So, the dilemma, as illustrated above, is whether to be adventurous and plunge into the unfamiliar, or to stick with the “I know what I like and I like what I know” principle. Perhaps it’s a sensible compromise to combine a little of each, dipping a toe in from the safety of dry land, so to speak?

          There are some things, however, that I would leave off my 'bucket list': bungee jumping is one and public nostril-hair trimming another.