I’m good at what I do.

It’s not the greatest answer. By no means one that will end up on a quotation site – and yes, of course, I will expand.

It is the right answer. It is why they should give me the job.

I try never to explain what I do for a living. It’s not that I am a spy, or that what I do is top secret – even if most of the documents I read are labelled as confidential; or sent via email with an angry, red exclamation mark stamped on it.

What I do is work for one institution, which hosts another – that works on behalf of a third one. If I say I work for the first one, they automatically assume it is something it is not. If I say I work for the second one, then I get a lot of blank expressions. Say I work on behalf of the third, and it seems to confuse those who think I do something entirely different.

But the key here is that when I do tell them – I have to explain it to them. Have to walk them through the links by which I get paid by one, work for another, based on requirements provided by the third.

Explaining – that’s what I’m good at.

I explain through sitting people down: in meetings, on teleconferences, in front of the documents I have written; and explain to them, in the words they are comfortable with – why I need them to help me. How they will soon be able to help themselves.

It’s not rocket science. The job I am going for will pay me far beyond what I am on now. Beyond what the tabloids believe is just, when compared to doctors or soldiers – I don’t set the salary scales.

What I do, is work. Work hard at converting the ideas of others in to plans, reports and achievable goals. Something they can measure. Something they can present to others as their own. Something – in this case – that should go on to benefit a great many, over the lifecycle of the project.

I can do this job, because, whisper it quietly, there are some parts I am already doing.

But more so, I can do this job, because it is what I am good at.

Ah, there’s my call to go in for the interview – see you all on the other side.

It’s a river.

Nothing more, nothing less.

It’s a fairly non-descript river. A river that has, through nature and man, had its course changed – its quality eroded – its importance altered over time. But it is, for all intents and purposes – still, just a river.

But as an idiom; it’s more than that. It is the point of no return. If you cross the river – metaphorically cross the Rubicon – the path of your life will have changed for good. For the good?

I’m reminded of the Rubicon as I plan a trip to Rome next week. I am reminded of how Julius Caesar once crossed the river, defying tradition – by leading his legions in to Italy, thus committing an act of treason; against the state – against Rome itself. It is not my intention to take Rome by force. I intend, in the main, to take it by sightseeing bus or Metro line.

But there is something that resonates here. For legions: read issues, troubles, thoughts and cares. No one should ever go to Rome with anything other a clear head, a spring in their step – a desire to absorb everything the Eternal City has to throw at them.

They shouldn’t be thinking about the board meetings they are missing, the new staff they have just recruited – that constant, nagging doubt that something might be unearthed in their absence.

They should embrace the fact that they are going for a special occasion, with a very important person. A very important person that will do things that might wind them up, that might give them reason to criticise – to admonish – but they shouldn’t. They should breathe, give themselves some space – and accept; accept that this is how it will be.

They know there is little chance they will keep to this view, but they know they really should. They must. It is definitely not always about them.

So they, OK, I, have six days. Six days to clear my desk of the important stuff. Six days to perfect my plastered on, faux smile and calm ways. Six days to clear my head of all the petty, minor things that could become so much more if I let them.  Six days to mass my legions and send them on some much needed R&R.

Six days till I cross my own, personal Rubicon.

Six days till Rome.

The next three connected posts – planned to run over the next three days – are about a subject that is, quite literally (Jamie), close to my heart; anxiety.

The first, connected, will try to give an understanding of how I came to accept I had to deal with my anxiety. The second, disconnected, will give an insight in to the root causes of my anxiety. The final piece, reconnected, will shed some light on how – I hope – I’ve learnt to identify and manage the times when the feelings of anxiety begin to take a hold.

It’s not something I find easy to write about. It’s not something I necessarily care for others to know about – but if this blog is about me, and my life, it seems wrong not to mention it. Even if I then choose to delete these posts sometime down the line. Ah well, here goes:

It’s been two years since my last episode.

The first person I went to see about my condition told me not to refer to them as panic attacks. He said they were more anxiety episodes, as though by softening – almost rounding the edges – it would make it easier to tackle.

I didn’t really get anything from those sessions.

I can vividly remember the last episode, for want of a better word then. I was sat in work, minding my own business, lost in my thoughts – which were clearly, wholly negative – and I felt what can only be described as a captain’s armband of pain grip my upper arm. I felt dizzy. My mouth was dry and my heart was racing. I was, at least I told myself I was, having a heart attack.

This was my third heart attack that week.

I quickly got up from my desk and ran to the door of the office; gasping for air – palms sweating so much that I struggled with the door knob. I thrust my hand in my pocket and took out my phone. I called Amy and told her I had to rush home. I had to see her. Only she could save me.

I didn’t tell anyone from work where I was going. No one would have cared anyway.

I near ran, for I can’t run with my knee – nor would I dare to run mid-heart attack – to the car. When I got there I saw someone had smashed in to one of our wing mirrors. That was my fault. Ours was the only damaged vehicle in a row of cars, but I had clearly parked in such a way that only I could be blamed for the smashed mirror. I went in to a rant. It was a rant at me more than anything. All the time I am still on the phone to Amy. Who was looking after Lauren – barely a month old at this time.

I got home. Checking for FBI helicopters as I drove (oh wait, no – that’s Goodfellas). When I got home I rushed to Amy, who was still holding Lauren, and sought instant salvation – from my heart, my head; my fears. I think I then went to bed, exhausted – as only nervous energy can wear you out.

I knew at that point that I needed extra help.

The episodes started shortly after I found out I was going to be a dad. It wasn’t just the fact I was going to have a child, but it was the last of a number of factors that seemed to push my mind in to the “precipice of doom” (I am prone to exaggeration). I had just agreed to buy a new house. I was changing jobs, but not one that made me feel any less of a failure than I did at the time. I’d stopped with most of the writing I was doing, and then – even after months of planning – the news that I was going to be a dad kind of hit home harder than I thought it would.

I ended up in the Leeds General Infirmary with a shortness of breath, as well as chest and arm pains – all classic heart attack symptoms. They did a few tests – they asked if I drank coffee (not too much), if I had any issues at home (no – though I am moving so which home do you mean?) and whether I was doing anything at the time I noticed the pains (not really – I was just moaning about how much I hated my job).

I went back, almost sheepishly to work. So there was nothing wrong with me I told myself.

As we moved through the months between Episode One and Lauren’s birth, my fear of heart attacks grew on an almost daily basis. I had an episode that made me run in to an Oxfam bookshop. I assumed, logically of course, that only old people go in to Oxfam shops, and as such they would be trained in CPR. I had another episode that meant I stood outside without any shoes on, so that if I did collapse, a passerby would note something had to be wrong – and they could save me. Why I was shoeless is still unclear. I even had an episode at the bottom of the hill that leads up to our house. I called Amy to come and drive me up the 200 yards to home, in the rain, whilst heavily pregnant, as otherwise I’d have stayed there all night.

I was back in the LGI on the day Lauren was due. It was clearly too much for me. They said they wanted to keep me in overnight for observation. Amy refused point blank, telling them she was due any day now. Amy was standing – nine months pregnant. I was sitting, sweating and moaning about my arm band of pain. We laugh about it now.

There was a lot of self doubt during this period – a lot of “oh woe is me” sort of internal and external monologues (I just talked at Amy). I missed a few nights out with friends, unsure I could get through a meal or drink without taking all my clothes off and running amok through the restaurant. I knew I wouldn’t, but then would you take the chance? No – exactly.

There was also a lot of toilet visits. Very little eating (I lost over a stone – which hey, that would help the old ticker) and plenty of (more than usual) moaning.

Which brings us to yesterday.

I wasn’t right in myself. I went to toilet a fair deal. My mouth was dry, my head held in my hands – I was irritable. I wanted to just curl up in a ball and hide from the world, from my family – from my thoughts.

Yesterday was the end point of a number of days. A number of days of moaning, of feeling down – of wanting to get away – of bad coffee and of upper arm tension. It was also the last day of my holiday. The day before I returned to work, a job I enjoy but wonder if – well, I could be doing better?

I thought I was past those sorts of days.

Clearly not – so I did the only thing I thought I could that would help me in that situation.

I cooked a ragù.

Title taken from the lyrics to “Panic” by The Smiths

I swear. I swear a lot.

I can never remember if it is like a docker, a trooper, a fox or a pig. Either way, it is something I do on a regular basis.

Or at least I once did.

Have a baby and everyone with or without a kid will instantly tell you that your life is about to change. What they don’t tell you is that, rather than the social, working or sporting side of your life – all of which you can just about manage to keep a hold of in some part – it is your mannerisms that change the most.

Before Lauren was born, I’d regularly call friends a ‘knobber’ – within reason, as in they had acted like one. It’s a playful, clearly derogative word, which suggests “I am picking up on something you have done, and wish to berate you, but do not wish for it to affect our friendship.” Clearly a part of me knows that it is wrong to go round calling people a knobber, but hey – I have my faults.

Then there is the C word. That one were people soften it by using the phrase “see you next Tuesday.” Oh what such fun people have with that. “You’re a see you next Tuesday.” Dear Christ – if you are going to insult someone, just sodding well do it. Don’t make a sentence out of it. How does that release the anger from within?

The thing with the C BOMB – let’s make it sound real here – is that, much like how The Simpsons’ Mr Burns will answer the phone with “ahoy hoy”, I will answer the phone with “Hello you c___.” Now clearly I don’t do this with everyone. I’m sure work wouldn’t appreciate it if I offend those that phone my office; nor do I think my Mum would take too kindly to such an opening to our conversations. But if your name is say – John Ioannou or Martin McNeill, chances are – in a cheery, upbeat manner, you will have the C BOMB dropped on you.

It doesn’t stop there. Give me a few beers, a group of mates, a bit of rumpus within our conversations and it’s “F-off this” or “anker” that. None of it is meant with malice – none of it is taken with malice. Admittedly a couple of people don’t like being referred to as a knobber on too regular a basis, but then – well, they’re just being knobbers.

But, and there seems to be a theme to this kind of comment, it doesn’t just stop with Lauren. I’ve noticed that I never swear in a social media context. I’m not sure if it is a view that I am carrying over from a working environment, where we treat every communication in the same professional manner – or if, and this is a scary thought – I simply do not want to offend people I may never meet?

What a bizarre thought. That I am more worried about offending people on twitter so that I tone down my language, than I am about how I talk to very good friends when I call them a “C___” or “knobber” in their company. Clearly twitter doesn’t get the real me – where as my friends sometimes get more than they bargained for. Who are the winners in that scenario?

The reason for this post is that I got told off this morning for swearing. I reacted to this telling off by, you guessed it, swearing. I don’t want Lauren to necessarily pick up on my bad habits – nor do I want her to walk in to nursery tomorrow and go round calling all her key workers, “C____”.

What I do want is a little freedom of expression. The ability to swear and not be sneered at, or told off, or lose face in front of people who don’t know me, will never meet me, but do occasionally react to what I write.

I guess I’m just being a knobber about it all. After all, Stephen Fry does it all the time – and people hang on his every word, be it polite or “abusive”. In fact, if he was to lean across to Alan Davies and call him a knobber for getting an answer wrong on QI, I image fellow panellists, audience and TV viewers will all laugh and nod in agreement.

But then, Stephen Fry is famous.

And I’m not. Fuck!

Stephen Fry on the joys of swearing (YouTube link)

I don’t dream. Not really. At night maybe, but not with what you might call hope.

Not in that genuinely enthusiastic way people with aspirations do. People who tell the world what their dream job might be, or where they hope to be living in 5, 10, 15 years time.

I talk long of my love for Italy, and how I’d one day like to live out there. That of course could be viewed as a dream. But ask me what I might do whilst I’m out there and the mind kind of draws a blank. I want the location; I just have no idea how to get past the language, the skills and the determination.

Dreaming just isn’t in my nature.

The problem you see is that I am too much of a realist. I provide my inner most thoughts with too many realistic answers to bat down any potential dreams that may start to form. I’ve always known that I was never going to be a professional footballer, so there would be no point in dreaming about scoring the winning goal in the FA Cup.

I also enter a lot of bowls competitions hoping I might one day get down to the national finals at Worthing, but would never dare dream that it may come off – I haven’t in 20 years, so why should this summer be any different?

It’s not that I am a defeatist. I enter everything with a desire to win, I just know from experience that I always fall somewhere along the line. Someone will beat me, another season will draw to a close and the plans to qualify for Worthing move onwards by another year.

It’s the same at work. I enjoy my job. A lot of what I do perfectly matches my personality profile – I’m great at the start of projects then get bored very quickly – which I guess is where the lack of dreaming comes in to play. If an idea sparks in my head, it’s great to play around with it – but the thought of actually trying to put it in to progress is confronted by the reality that, at some point, those green shoots of hope will turn in to a rather boring flower. One that only looks good for a very short period of time, and even then it looks much like every other flower around it.

My mum assures me that I only ever wanted to be a PE teacher as a child. I tried to put that in to practice by doing Sport Studies at A’ Level and starting a sports based degree programme, but even then there is a point that you can trace back to – me leaving/advised to leave school – where had I stayed, Sport Studies would not have been an option. I would not have started on that path – I would have studied something else. Hardly a lifelong dream.

So what could I be? What dreams should I cultivate until they blossom – forming a delicate, divine flower head to cup; to embrace?

I am being honest when I say I simply don’t know. Whenever asked by friends what I would like to do if I am caught moaning about work, or lack of progression/motivation – I sit there looking at them blankly; desperate for an idea, no matter how farfetched to caress my imagination and explode forth with a stream of plans, goals – near impossible targets. It never happens.

I’m not sure it ever will.

But I do want to dream. I want to be able to sit down across the table from them, with glass of wine in hand and hold court – outlining the very way in which I will make my dreams come to fruition. How I will extract a mere idea, and turn it in to a joyous experience. I just can’t get beyond reality.

Take journalism for an example. I’ve done a fair bit of writing for national publications and websites – a lot of it well received – but then thoughts turn to the boring repetition of some of that work; or the distinct lack of qualifications in a field dominated by graduates – even the number of hits I get on this blog, and I’ve ruled that out long ago.

What about cooking? I like cooking. Ah, but I don’t like fish, or tomatoes really – in their solid, waiting to annoy me with their juice and seeds form, or a lot of vegetable textures for that matter – so that kind of rules out being a chef as a profession.

I can’t even use the excuse of a young family crushing my dreams, as I know Amy would be fully supportive of anything I came up with (within reason – re money, distance apart). It is even that grateful support that got me thinking that I really should do something creative, something utterly wonderful with my (read our) life – I just keep going to the well of inspiration and coming up with only rope – no bucket attached.

Write a book Amy says. Being indecisive as to the subject is about as far as I ever get.

So instead I drift. A blank canvas hoping others will include me in their dreams. Leading me; teasing out my creativity – making me feel alive to the possibilities of the ideas in my head – at least until such a time when I get bored and look to others to take me in a different direction.

But maybe it’s time I went in my own direction, under my own steam – living my own dream. But then how do you stop a realist coming up with all the reasons why they never will? How can you turn a blank canvas in to a work of art? How can you make someone with no dreams, finally see the light – become someone they’ve always wanted to be (well, since 1.30 this afternoon)?

It might take as little as winning a game of bowls tonight, or picking up that teach yourself Italian podcast again. Something so small that it sparks my imagination without me even noticing – and there, stood before you – you will find me living the dream.

Well. I can but dream.

The title of this blog is adapted from the Philip K. Dick novel “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?” or Blade Runner to the cinema goers amongst you

Do you ever have one of those days where everything you do appears to come signposted, or at least has a symbol associated with it – a negative portent, if not an enormous neon sign advising you turn back?

I’m about to walk in to a meeting where a delegate has been replaced by a more senior member of the workforce. Historically this has meant that something has gone wrong, some bad news is coming our way; I have to find the right words to pass on to others – that can’t include panic, problem or crisis. When managers appear, bad news is never too far behind them.

I was also first in a group to get my sandwich at lunch time. The others had to wait; mine was ready in an instant. Their orders included olives, lettuce, low fat cheese – mine was just pig. There were no queues for the artery clogging pig portions – only the salads. I had a coughing fit as a bit of pig went up my nose (mid-previous cough). Maybe I should eat more salad?

The key symbol of the day though is the dead wasp that lies prone outside the men’s toilet at work. I know it’s dead as it has been there for four weeks now – three of which the head has been detached from the thorax.

I look at that wasp every day.

How many metaphors are wrapped up in that dead wasp?

How many times do I walk over it, grumbling something about how much the next level up are missing the point of a piece of work we are doing? It is as though the management level (head) is in a different zone of thinking to those of us (thorax) that do the work on a daily basis. The head has now completely disappeared –no doubt ground down or jammed in to the sole of a worker’s shoe. There is no parallel of this at work, as it is usually the heads that stay – where as the wider body is dispensable.

I wonder if I should pick the body up and give it a proper burial (thrown in a bin somewhere – though I’m not sure which of the environmentally sound recycling bins a thorax goes in?). But then isn’t there something in the sting still being active even after the wasp has died? All day at work I feel like any time I offer to help others out, I get stung with the weight of responsibility/negativity that comes with the fall out of something going wrong. Leave well alone.

Then there is the issue of trust. We trust the cleaners to provide a level of service that removes dirt/debris from the surface of our floors. If this wasp has been lying there for four weeks, that patch of carpet has clearly not been touched in that time. Contractually it is agreed they will not touch anything on our desks for fear that something may be moved – turned off, spilt, damaged – what have you. Yet if they are not cleaning that part of the carpet – what else, of the areas they can touch – are they not responding to?

I know they are stuffing the tissue holders in the toilets to the point of bursting – forcing you to tear handfuls free in your moment of need – but maybe a test could be carried out on other parts of the carpet; or am I just being petty now? If I can sit at my desk and let my mind wander, or check emails on the internet – are the cleaners not allowed to miss a dead wasp at the highest point of the building? The dilemma there is whether or not I would prefer to be a comrade or a snitch – former; always the former.

Finally and here is where I might find similarities in the passing of my friend the wasp – it did die at the highest point in the building – life stifled where there was nowhere else to fly to.

Trapped inside the building, it would have flown about looking for an escape route before succumbing to the needs of whatever it is a wasp lives on; dying – in a desolate spot – far from its fellow wasps, or life bringing properties.

I sometimes wonder if my career of the last five years is like that. I’ve spent a good period of time with my current employer – taking lateral moves, learning new skills – working on intensive projects that suit my personality (I hate the concept of a career doing the same thing) and needs; offering the benefits of easy hours/good holidays. Yet every time I’ve mooted the idea of moving up – I’ve been trapped by a ceiling of skills, knowledge, qualifications – advised to fly around a bit more in my current role. Told to wait for the right skylight to open – which will see me flit higher towards the grade I finally hope to reach. It never happens.

Instead I grow tired of flying around and dart for the next open door – moving in to another room, with a higher ceiling, yet still no obvious route out. The reason I carry on searching is that I know one of these rooms will have an open skylight – will allow me out and up in my career; I just need to show more determination than the now, dead wasp.

Of course it helps that I know where the front door is; that I can take advantage of the life giving properties at my desk – and I hope that one day, should I ever been found on the floor – someone will pick me up, will look after me and will make sure head and thorax remain intact.

At least, unlike my dead friend – I still have hope.

Ok, so the title is slightly misleading.

It’s not meant to imply that porn is the friend; a crutch I rely on when I’m down or have certain urges.

No. What I mean is that I have a friend who works in the porn industry. A friend who now goes by the professional name of Lara Latex – her real world name forever lost to her thousands of fans on facebook and twitter.

We met at college. We were on the same course, though she was in the year above. We played on the same Volleyball team, had the same group of mates and went on the same nights out – though I think we both would have preferred to have been somewhere less commercial in the main.

Our friendship blossomed as her final year at college drew to a close. If the weather was nice, I’d actively seek her out to walk towards a tube station via her house, even though it added at least half an hour to my journey home. She was a great sounding board – someone who would happily (I think) listen for hours as I battled through the latest, teen-related angst issue that clouded my day.

We shared a great number of interests, happy times and even, it appeared, shared the same career aspirations – which for a time, she was the only one to fulfil.

And then it all changed.

I found out about “Lara’s” new vocation innocently enough – if you call using a scrambled cable box after far too many drinks, an innocent thing. Nothing can prepare you for the shock of seeing someone you know as a friend, in such an intimate – adult entertainment setting. I remember turning over so as to erase the memory, embarrassed that I was peering in to a part of her world that I wasn’t meant to. A quick text confirmed that it was definitely her, and yes – she was happy. Yet the fact that I didn’t know highlights how much the friendship had drifted.

We recently got back in touch via twitter. The thing about social media is that it not only allows you to reacquaint with those you have lost touch with, it also aids you in terms of reflection on a great number of things – to consider what you have, and even what might have been – should you want to go down that route. Talking to “Lara” made me realise how much distance – both physical and professional – there was now between us.

I doubt for one minute that if you had eavesdropped in on one of those walks home – you would ever have been able to predict the paths our lives would have taken to where you find us today. But is that not the fascinating aspect to the choices we can make within our lives? The fact that they are not pre-ordained; not set in stone – no matter what we may think as innocent youths; who assume their lives won’t alter and they’ll remain friends for a very long time.

Lives do change – ours changed for the better.

University originally took us apart, and although there were opportunities for the friendship to develop further – for whatever reason it never happened. Then a call at a bad time, a lost phone before the days of backing up and the new career choices affecting both our lives put distance and a lot of memories between us – ones we were never likely to share.

I’m not ashamed to admit that even though I’ve known of her career choice for a decade now, I still feel slightly prudish when I see some of her tweets or facebook entries. Offers of images uploaded for her fans, or requests to vote for her in an industry award – at one point I’d have been the first in line to give her my support, but that was in a sporting context or when she felt down after an exam. Following a link to a website organised by a TV channel too high in the listings for a married, father of one – is something I feel uneasy doing.

But then why should I feel that way? Some of her tweets, sent in real time situations, are nothing worse than you would see dramatised in the ITV programme, Belle de Jour. She is often mocking, playful, cutting – those same personality traits she displayed when younger; but this is not on a volleyball court, or walk home. This is a window in to the adult entertainment world. A world I am not part of; where my friend is not the person I knew.

For our world will always be those spring walks home, talking about tunes, clubbing, mates and a well executed B Quick for her to hit through the middle. It’s not that I want to go back there; for I am lucky – I can use social media to reflect and come out with a positive result. I may not have wanted to be sat behind a desk or to be on the wage I am now, but I just have to go home tonight to realise what I have to be thankful for. Reading “Lara’s” tweets about living a life between the UK and Budapest, building a successful career on both sides of the camera – it’s hard not to assume that she’s also happy with her lot as well.

Her professional world may be dramatically different to mine – yet work isn’t what makes us as people, even if most of the contacts on her social media pages are driven solely by her ability to entertain. Once we walk from our office, or off set, we’re still deep down the same people we were that made us friends. Which is why I can’t open her links, go to the websites she directs “me” to or not look upon her followers with a level of disdain – as if they have no right to virtually paw at her the way they do. It’s hard not to be prudish when you still have the memories of old, which were forged long before our lives changed.

I’m confident that should we get the chance to meet up again, have a few drinks and talk about our lives – now and then – that the old friendship will kick right back in; with no effort from either side. Though I do think I’d have to get sign off, in triplicate, that Amy was happy with me out on the town with a porn star; friend or not. I even timidly checked that she was ok with me befriending “Lara” on facebook – just in case any of her mates got the wrong idea, and called me out for being a “dirty old man” – for I’m not, and for whatever need to impress reason, it’s not how I want to be viewed.

If it’s possible to be a be a prude, to feel ever so slightly protective – yet ultimately proud of a friend, then that is what I feel for “Lara”. She’s forging a career for herself as a leading light in her industry, nominated for awards and has thousands hanging on her every facebook entry. I’d love that popularity – just don’t expect me to take my clothes off any time soon.

If however you are partial to the sort of material that “Lara” produces or performs in, and you don’t feel the need to check with the wife if this is ok, then please do access her material legally; do vote for her in her industry awards. Do even follow her on twitter – though chances are she’ll no doubt bore you with her love for Hercule Poirot; though I’m not entirely certain that dialogue is her biggest asset these days.