The Ned Wood Archive

Joe

Joe is happy on so many levels. He’s got that satisfied feeling from getting up early and getting his shower in. He’s always been one of those smug morning people that think everyone else is missing the best time of day, although he has, fortunately, learned that it’s best not to tell everyone. And now, he’s got the pleasure he gets from having shaved off his beard. He’d forgotten how pleasant it is to have a smooth chin. On top of that, there’s the warm contentment of walking round the festival. That never fails to bring him joy, especially when the weather is so fine. But, of course, the biggest thing is the bliss he’s carried with him since Friday.

Maybe there is a special realm or a dimension in which the emotions exist. They move about separately in this realm. They evolve separately. And these separate emotions are independent of the people who hold them. Or maybe these floating emotions are linked to the emotions that people have but exert an overwhelming influence on them. Like you just breathe them in like the air as you walk past. And maybe this part of Somerset is where love and happiness and warmth and compassion reside. And if you had a device, a detector or something, that measured love and could track the love inside people and maybe if you compared before and after, on the Wednesday morning and on the Sunday evening, you’d find that the amount of love carried by each person at Glastonbury had increased, dramatically, over the five days.

He walked past a stall where they were playing that Kirsty MacColl song Thankyou for the Days. That’s when he realised what ‘seize the day’ actually meant. If you have a day like he’d had on Friday, you have to hold onto it tightly. Treasure it. Wrap it up and keep it somewhere safe. Sunday morning is when they usually start having that conversation, him and Tom and the others. Which was your best Glastonbury? How does this Glastonbury compare? He already knows the answer. Has done since about 9am on Friday. This is the best one. Ever. No competition. Whatever else happens.

He’s stopped trying to work out what that thing meant: ‘you don’t know when to use your heart and when to use your head’?  He’d been thinking about what he should do since he parted from that woman in the Healing Field.  He was about to call her ‘that witch’, but that wasn’t right.  She said her name was Penny and that ain’t a witch’s name.  Shouldn’t she be called Cassandra or Hecate or something?  Not Penny.  

Anyway, if he was going to use his head, then he knew where Ellie was going to be later that day.  She’d be at Bastille, so he’d go find her.  Then he looked at his Clashfinder and realised that meant trouble.  Bastille start about fifteen minutes before Hamish Hawk.  He’d need to find her quick, persuade her to go see Hamish Hawk, then have both of them leg it up to the Park pronto.  It ain’t gonna happen.

But the mood he’s in, it don’t matter. He feels like anything could happen. She’ll just turn up in the three or four hours before Hamish Hawk starts.  All he needs to do is what he usually does and everything will work out.

When he gets back to the tent after having shaved his beard off, he obviously creates a bit of a stir.  Tom’s there.  Megan too.  They like it.  So does George when he surfaces.  So, that’s a plus.  But what should he do next?  He’s stuck trying to decide where to go to increase the chances of bumping into Ellie ahead of that evening.  In the end, he decides to hang around with Tom, go with him to whatever he’s seeing.  Go with the flow as it were.  Stuff could happen.

First off, Tom and some of his Bristol mates drag him over to Peel to see Erotic Secrets of Pompeii.  They’re a wacky five piece.  Black clad witches and warlocks.  Bet they have proper witchy names, like Belladonna or Hemlock or Minerva.  Or Ozzie.  This lot are chaotic.  Theatrical.  Entertaining.  Discordant.  Wild.  Mainly angular guitars stabbing you in the eyes.  Plus a singer who’s had his own eyes stabbed out and replaced with violent piercing lasers.          

Then Tom and Max drag him over to West Holts Bar for a proper punk band.  Brash barre chords, a pogo beat, and shouted lyrics.  They’re called Noah and the Loners and they get Joe bouncing around the tent even though it’s just him dancing.  Tom never joins in, but he expected better from Max. It’s the best Glastonbury ever. Are they not having as much fun as he is?