Introducing …

Introductions. Too much like phatic talk. Best to lob the listener in at the deep end, hope they float on the raft of your words – if they don’t, jettison the load before you sink with boredom.

My name is Rachael. It’s not a name I was fond of as a child, but then it was generally associated with trouble, e.g. my mother yelling it at my small, retreating back in a supermarket. It’s grown on me in adulthood, but still has a foreign ring to it. So “Rach” will do fine.

I’m 28 years old, and have yet to enter a single bar / supermarket / purveyor of the fine gold mead that is Morgans’ Spiced rum, without being ID’d. I guess the decent genes will serve me well when I’m old enough to care about such things. (Incidentally, if you take this stuff neat, the cassia spice and vanilla seep through to burn the tongue; drink it chilled with coke, and you’re treated to the Quality Street green triangles. Mmm, praline.)

I still have something of an aversion to looking people in the eye. This tails back to a slimy insecurity of yesteryears, a horrid compunction to become everyone’s doormat. I didn’t want people to know that I was deathly afraid of them. History has taught me well, still teaches me how to care for myself more, one day at a time. Anorexia is not something to play with, kids.

I often force myself to stare down certain individuals, for the fun of it. To watch their pupils dilate and contract with confusion. Or drugs, I don’t know. I’m not responsible for everyone.

When not chained to my first novel, “End of the Line”, I blog articles of general interest. These range from health (personal trials with depression / anorexia; life with the sense-mingling syndrome, synaesthesia) to political events past and present, as well as book and film reviews. As an ex Film Studies student, I’m still impossible to watch anything with. Favourite genres include Post-WWI Soviet agi-prop (“Battleship Potemkin”) and Weimar cinema (“Nosferatu”), as well as good old Brit cults ‘n classics (“Brief Encounter”, “Withnail & I.”) These have had heavy influences upon my writing; which really means, I’m a metaphor fiend.

I throw knives in between the films and literary work. I make no allusions of grandeur, the walls of my home are as pock-marked as the career between them.

Bill, of the Kill infamy, most likely has Native Indian ancestory. Turquoise ring and long hair. He lies closer to the ground than most people – like Leon, like Aragorn, like Sgt’s Elias and Barnes. He lives outside of society, he is what they call, a Natural Born Killer. They don’t usually get along so well with humans.

These are people I respect.

I collect archaic blades and guitars. The current tally on both sides stands at five. No preference between East and West, electric and acoustic.

I still dream of Gutersloh, the RAF base where I grew up. Dad was a radio engineer on the Harrier and Chinook, Mum radio comms for the SeaKing / lifeboat rescues. To this upbringing I owe my perfectionism, travelling feet and loneliness that doesn’t ease in human company. I got only glimpses of the European countries we toured, being too small to take in much; but what I do remember, left lasting impressions.

I am no oil painting. Only a scrappy canvas, flecked by the brushes of many people.