Hardeep Singh Kohli: Twice as lonely marooned on a double bed

Published on Sunday 31 May 2009 00:48

Some of you who have dipped into my ramblings over the past year and a half will possibly be aware of my post-separation forays into the world of solitary shopping, solitary cooking, solitary existing.

The greatest of all solitary pursuits that I have had to adjust to has been sleeping. Apparently I will have spent the better part of five months of the last eighteen asleep. Alone. It's a strange experience, solitary sleeping.

When I was a boy I used to share beds with my brothers. It used to drive my dad to distraction, the fact that we all had our own beds yet at a moment's notice we would dive under the same duvet together. It was just so much more fun. We chatted, played, fought and laughed. There was an esprit de corps about that togetherness; it's what it meant to be brothers. And there was the Sunday morning ritual when the three of us brothers would pile into our parents' bed, once they had vacated it. I will always remember the feeling of glee.

And once married, a bed shared was the most perfect way to be. Simon and Garfunkel songs sung at the top of our voices in a wee flat off the Byres Road. And which married couple doesn't have a story to relate about being compelled to push two single beds together only to find oneself in a crevice of sheeting between the beds at four in the morning? And the nocturnal interruptions of a small, half-asleep, half-awake child gently elbowing them-shaped space between you. Nights spent exchanging the sweet air of your progeny, wrapping your languid arms around their comforting warmth. Those days all seem so very distant.

I found myself looking at my unmade bed this morning (as I seem to do every morning). There's no warm body coiled there in an unnatural half-moon of sleep. Without me it is just an unmade bed; the left half is seldom molested by an incomer. The right side, the radio side, my side of the bed is a turbulent sea of fitful nights; the left side is the most placid lake of loneliness. I have worked out that I only ever have to make one side of the bed. The other side is a mysterious dark continent, a place I seldom venture.

I really ought to have just a single bed; it's as if the vast width of the duvet, the very mattress itself is taunting my loneliness. I have worked out how to overcome this issue. I will from now on sleep laterally ensuring that my bed isn't too big without you. Whoever you might be.

From now on Ommm is my mantra

Maybe it's a symptom of age, maybe an upside of gradually acquired wisdom through life but I have definitely of late felt the need to connect with some sort of spirituality. Organised religion seems fraught with problems. Sectarian murders carried out in the name of religion, Sikh holymen slaughtered in European cities and the Church of Scotland tearing itself apart over issues of sexuality – there seems very little solace in structured belief.

I have felt only too aware of a lack of self-reflection in my life, the sort of reflection that genuine prayer brings. There are those atheists who mock the act of prayer but maybe that's just too easy. If by prayer one means an attempt to allow one's mind to escape the hurly burly of life and find some quieter place, some more spiritual place, then surely that must be a good thing? My best friend is a Buddhist and he has been encouraging me to chant a bit; he's sure that the repetitive spiritual focus can help me order my mind, assuage my fears and help me through the next wee while.

After much prevaricating, I hauled myself over to his place and we did indeed sit together and chant. Once you overcome the self-consciousness of these strange four words exiting your mouth repeatedly and you embrace the process, you soon begin to realise the deep comfort to be attained from meditation. How often in our lives do any of us sit still and relax for 20 straight minutes?

Shine a light on Jim

Growing up in Glasgow through the 1980s it was difficult not fall in love with music. Deacon Blue, Lloyd Cole, Edwyn Collins, The Pearlfishers, Altered Images; it seemed the city had an unending source of brilliant musicians with brilliant sounds. And then of course there was Simple Minds. I have to confess that it wasn't cool to like the Minds when I was a lad. Jim Kerr wore make-up and that simply wasn't the done thing in a pre-Boy George era. And the band made obscure and inaccessible music that didn't sound Scottish. And they danced funny on Top of the Pops, Kerr with all that squatting and imaginary grabbing. Simple Minds were weird. However, as time softened my ridiculous position of anti-foundation, anti-innovative dancing and anti-weirdness, I grew to like and then love their music. One favourite album was the critically under-acclaimed New Gold Dream, a record full of beautifully anthemic tracks. I rediscovered the album last Wednesday night, thanks to the gift of the iTunes store. If anything the album sounds better today than it did all those years ago in 1982. Some dreams don't lose their lustre.

Homage to Catalonia

The Champions League final on Wednesday night offered me a conundrum. Should I support the British team Manchester United, a team from a city I like and have lived in but a football team that I abhor with every footballing ounce of my being (especially since they destroyed my beloved Arsenal in the semi-final)? Or do I support Barcelona, a team from a city I adore having only visited once but who now have a striker (Thierry Henry) who will always be beloved by Arsenal fans. No-brainer, as they say. I wish I knew the Catalan for "we are the champions".