It only feels like one. Oh, how sweet is this suffering. Man U 0 Everton 1, Chelsea 2 Bolton 1 at half time. Heaven. Then it all changes. Courtesy of a flap by a rookie keeper...and a magnificent own goal by the uglier half of the two brothers ugly...un-fucking-believable...
But it ain't over...nay, for faithless is he that says farewell when the road darkens...
From Explosions in the Sky.
It starts with a ripple, a steady stillness that gradually builds, and builds...layer upon layer, a perpetual simmering beneath the surface, a promise of a coming crescendo that never quite materialises...a still calmness tempered with fire...like watching gathering storm clouds in a distance over wide open fields...streaks of lightning flashing silently in a faraway sky somewhere miles away from where you are...
It's that happy memory of childhood that comes and goes, but never fades, all those times coming home after a long summer's day out with your best bud, your shirt slick with sweat, your shoes caked with mud, grinning inanely as the sun falls lazily behind you. It's having a fag with your pals during your teenage years at the beach, feeling that cool sea breeze in your hair, and talking about nothing in particular like it's the most important conversation you'd ever have (and maybe it is).
It's like hanging round a playground as that magic hour of dusk approaches, the sound of kids laughing and playing somewhere in the background, some guys finishing up their evening kickabout round the field, people doing their warm-down after finishing their lap round the neighbourhood block, all oblivious to the world 'cept that particular moment they're caught up in.
It's building a camp fire in the middle of nowhere and getting eaten by mosquitos but loving every second of it. It's waking up just before the sun rises and to be at a place where people gather before taking a long journey. It's all the things that are great in life, waking moments out of a dream.
Eh, let's all hope, and let us all pray, that these shadows shall pass, and we'll nip it one day. C'mon you Blues, get it done. Clear eyes, full hearts, can't lose!
