Never Long Enough
A friend passed away this week, which is something I will never get used to or cope with acknowledging. It was a friend that I hadn’t seen in a while, something that I had been regretting anyway over the past two years of not being able to see anyone and now I’ll continue to regret it much longer than is sensible. I can’t pretend it was only because of that. It was also because the transitory nature of life and circumstances changing like they always do and always will. People move, jobs change, kids happen and suddenly where a few years ago I was once hankering for social contact, I have now collapsed into middle age where time is suddenly so precious and fleeting. I spend days nostalgic for nights out and human contact but in reality, I can only really get excited about the days where I know there is nothing planned. On those I can pretend I might claw back some of the energy that has rapidly dissipated thanks to parenting and well, the exhaustion that just seems to accompany the general state of things.
I used to find it comforting knowing that things moved on and time progressed. One of the best bits of advice when I started doing comedy was ‘it’s only a few minutes, and then you get off stage and it’s done’. That realisation made those sets where I was dying in front of a silent or irate crowd, suddenly seem less devastating. So what if these jokes don’t work and they don’t like me? In 5, 10, 20, 30 minutes I’ll be done, gone and out of the door and they’ll never see me again. (With the exception of the audience at the Corn Exchange Kings Lynn who unfortunately due to a booking error, had to see me again a month later. But again, only for 30 minutes and then I was in the car and heading home). This run I’m on feels awful, but I tell myself I’ve only got 15 minutes to go, and then it’s over and I can go home and eat crisps and sit still and that’s that. This week of work is yet again overbooked and unmanageable but then it’ll be done, and the next week will happen and none of it will matter.
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Yet, I’m starting to find the speed with which things change and disappear and stop being a lot harder to deal with now. How has it been so long since I last saw friends? How has our daughter already stopped being so tiny and is suddenly a little person? How have I spent 20 years doing comedy but don’t feel like I’ve even begun or done anywhere near enough? Why are so many films more than 90 minutes when we all know that’s unreasonable? Time escapes me so quickly and I don’ t appreciate it anymore. It doesn’t feel like there’s the endless bountiful supply of it like there used to be and I now spend far too much of it wishing I could scoop bits of it up and store it somewhere. Saving it for when I might need it. When I’m really feeling like it’s disappearing and I can just delve into some of it from 10 years ago when I had more of it, and the world felt less heavy, and my friend was still there.
To quote a friend who was quoting another, all the things you enjoy about doing comedy in your 20’s, you hate about it in your 40’s. The world I worked in disappeared with Covid and I longed for it to come back. Now it has, I don’t want much of what it brings. I am too tired for the late nights and long drives, the thought of a service station sandwich creates instant stomach despair. I feel I don’t know what to say to audiences right now about anything that might be comforting or hilarious rather than just a general tired burbling about how the planet is on its last legs and I’d much rather be at home, with my family than still pretending to care about asking what they do for a living. The post show adrenaline that lasted all night and more, now lasts minutes. The round the world adventures now just feel like time away from the kid. The post show random drink adventures now shout ‘hangover’ at me before I can even begin them.
The best bits of the job though, were often not the comedy shows but seeing friends. Getting long car journeys or being on the bills with people I would only be lucky enough to see once or twice a year if that and whose company I would be so excited to in again. The catch-up drunken chats in the courtyards at the fringe or backstage at a festival tent, shoving the beer rider into my backpack at the same time. Now so many of those people have stopped doing it. Or moved onto their own tours or bigger things or something else entirely. And sadly, some just aren’t with us anymore. So, there isn’t the best bit like there used to be and I have to ask myself why I’d want to do it without that. There is a wave of new people, as it should be, and as it will always be. They have energy and new things to say and new ways of doing things that are innovative and exciting. I take comfort in thinking that maybe I’ve done my bit with it now and that’s that. I had never understood this complaining that things are changing or that audiences didn’t get what they were saying anymore, when yes, that is how time works. We move on, they move on, the world moves on and that’s that. Even if sometimes I wish it wasn’t.
The joy of a creative job is that no one tells you what to do or what to make and how to be. But as time vanishes, this has become a burden. Now I want someone to tell me it’s not worth wasting my time on that, or maybe try doing something else entirely. Or even just no, definitely don’t spend that whole day travelling to somewhere to talk to people you don’t know about things you don’t care about. The funny thing is, the friend I hadn’t seen for a while was someone who did do that for me when I knew him well. He directed my shows, he advised me on what to do, we laughed hysterically at stupid, stupid ideas and filthy jokes again and again. And I, after a while, decided I could move myself forward, having learned so much. He too, had many other people to guide and laugh with. Because things move on. And that was ok and how it should be. Even if I sometimes wish it wasn’t.
I will keep missing how things were, and I will keep missing my friend. But this week will go and next week will happen again. Before I know it, I’ll feel ok and find myself in the middle of something else. I’ll be wishing it would all hurry past so I can once again get to the next. It’s the best and worst bit of life. The speed with which it escapes you. I just have to remember to pause every now and then at where things are, even if wish they weren’t.
