Love on the NHS (41 page)

What did worry Luke was that as people were all too often concerned only with their own passionate political cause they neglected a wider duty to humanity. An elected government, for example, might invest very well in affordable housing for disabled people but do nothing for the majority of people who were spending up to half their income on extortionate rents. As long as political debate was marginalised and people made afraid to have opinions, it would only lead to trouble. For eventually when a revolution or rebellion did occur, it would happen far more peacefully and smoothly in a situation in which people were well informed and able to co-operate with one another.

And it was also true that once a revolution did occur, the more divided a society was the more likely the government that would be set up by the victors of the revolution would not progress the cause of humanity. Of course, in these days of globalization and the need for countries to band together to be economically competitive, matters affecting entire regions were becoming more important than domestic ones. Each continent had its own areas to improve on - some to become more peaceful, others to allow more civil rights, some to grant more economic competition, others to unite more between disparate countries and to strengthen their culture.

In Germany the widespread membership in trade unions and stable political system and economic growth it fostered proved that giving workers a voice was preferable to not doing so. Germany had avoided the tragic recessions other countries with more primitive industrial relations had been sank into. It was important that people from different countries did not turn against one another either  as that was another useless division between people - and used as justification for war. What was war in the end? It could be fought for valiant reasons but in every conflict the same brutal reality was presented - more than anyone else, it was the innocent and uninvolved who were hurt. Leaders rarely if ever fought for their causes nor their children but they had no qualms in demanding the same of their people and their children. In Europe, now that a terrible recession had hit countries like Spain and Greece there was a danger the wealthier countries would neglect them and turn away. That too could lead to a dangerous uprising - and not necessarily a good one. Revolutions could go both ways and in Greece it was evident that far right - engaged in violent racism and blaming certain races for economic woes - were a serious threat.

Luke did not feel he was himself the person to get involved in such matters. He had already experimented with joining political parties or activist groups and realized he did not have the personality to  suit that kind of thing. And so he kept on checking the HomeSwapper website for matches, praying that one would turn up.

LXIII

Of an evening or a weekend if Luke sought entertainment it was not a walk in the park, literally nor figuratively He would have loved to have had a local DVD rental shop to browse in. In Lawson's Creek his favourite characters Racey Witty and Lawson Seery worked in their local video store. It was a venue for many dramatic and interesting exchanges involving friendship, girls and love triangles. People wandering in would initiate a relationship or talk about am impasse they had reached in their life. Video and DVD rental stores had been a wonderful place in Luke's eyes. Friends had used to gather in them to share news; it was a place for people to mill about a while without pressure to spend money, somewhere to put it all into perspective and watch the world go by. Luke wished such places existed - as they had once.

Every year Children in Need would raise even more money than the last year - yet where all that money went, who knew. Could some of it not be used to create some DVD rental shops? A thing that made Luke despair was that charities focused too much on politically correct services. It was almost always something like counselling, training or a sports league they aimed to provide. The lack of imagination and creativity was laughable. Luke did not believe charities achieved that much in any case. Private education was the only guarantee for a good life. He did not envy anyone who had it: he only wished he could have the same - and others like him who were not given much of a chance at achieving anything. Judges, lawyers, journalists, politicians, high-ranking businesspeople, even scientists; most of the these upwardly mobile people had been privately educated. They would tend to form large networks of contacts in school. Later they would take full advantage of their social capital to  secure promotions and deals.

Luke could have gone to the gym but he had joined two in the past and had despised them both. If people got something out of them, more power to them! - but Luke was certain he did not. From large and hairy bodies getting too close for comfort to the sweat-stained handles of oversubscribed running machines, the only kind of exercise it felt like for Luke was one in futility. The staff who worked in gyms always bothered him too. They looked at him disparagingly for not being as muscular as most men. They did not seem so concerned about helping people get fit as much as pumping up their own bodies to vainly large proportions.

There was so much excess energy going to waste in people evidently, what with all these gym memberships. It could have been put to better use. There could be volunteer groups consisting of physically able and energetic people who would undertake projects like building gardens in deprived areas (digging after all is very hard work) or doing renovation and decorating work for elderly people, disabled people and people on a low income. A well decorated home with up-to-date fittings and features could transform a person's life sometimes. There was also something elitist about a lot of exercise from Luke's point of view. Certainly so in the case of competitive sport in which people's aim was to outdo one another rather than have fun and keep fit. He could understand the appeal of a cycling or running group more. The salient point for Luke however was that all such social groupings were too contrived; they lacked an organic base to them, having been built on nothing more than shared interests. In Luke's experiences real friendship was made of sweat and instinct, not a shared hobby.

In terms of entertainment, theatres in Woecaster had some great plays on occasionally; generally though the schedules were full of of provincial nonsense. Some of the kitchen sink dramas about domestic abuse were hard hitting and thought provoking - but their scope was narrow. Luke wanted to see Shakespeare, Ibsen or Tennessee Williams. There actually were a few of Williams' plays staged and they were often very good but Luke found the theatres themselves a let down. Their atmosphere did not create a true impression of culture. The same was true of all the theatres nearby. He never felt he could chat to anyone during intervals or before and after the play. Nothing dramatic or interesting ever happened off the stage. Even when he enjoyed the evening, it served to remind him of how dull his and the people's lives around him were. Why could he not have had some transcendent conversation with a girl at the bar or bumped into an old friend and exchanged maudlin reminiscences over shots of whiskey? Alas, it seemed such bittersweet comforts occurred only in TV shows and books.

Yet Luke could believe there was more to world. More to experience with all of the senses. There was something about the area around Duldrum - and Woecaster, all of Greater Woecaster for that matter - that unsettled everything. Tall poppy syndrome was what someone clever had called it - it was a phrase invented to describe a country or place in which individual excellence or appearing or talking clever was frowned upon. Luke had always felt in Woecaster that when he dressed up well, people enviously tore into him with their looks. Though he had little self-belied he seemed to have been by destiny appointed to be that tall flower the others were jealous of. In a bar or restaurant when he was served, the waiters would call him "mate," as was not unusual in Woecaster - though it also happened all over the UK to a degree. This levelling term of endearment would make Luke feel small. While appearing friendly the word was actually used to keep the customer tethered: they were not allowed to hold the notion they were there to enjoy eating or drinking; the invisible rule was they must treat their experience as a communal ritual, behaving deferentially.           There was something false about it all. Australians used the word mate and Luke thought they had a very intolerant attitude towards different people too as a rule. Despite their happy-go-lucky nature there was a certain conformity and expectation of being a bloke in Australia. London was a lot better in that regard, however he had found Boston in America the best for true freedom of character. On his second holiday there, despite wearing a suit and shirt nobody treated him unpleasantly. For all its faults, America did not suffer from an emotionally unstable class warfare.

There was another behaviour all the local waiters seemed to adopt. They liked to clatter dishes they collected very noisily and within earshot of the customers if possible. It was usually done on a table in the dining area and Luke would have liked to have believed it was because they were low paid; but he could not believe that was always the full story. In other places he had visited in the world, people were no better off financially but they had shown more courtesy. One of the more overlooked aspects of Asperger's syndrome is its effect on a person's senses. People always appreciate Asperger's impacts people's social skills after a bit of reading up on the condition but the heightened sensory awareness it gives people can be equally debilitating. Luke felt he was being attacked when loud noises kept striking his ears all around him.

LXIV

Of all the mass participation events the one Luke liked the least were marathons. One weekend when he arrived in Woecaster one was in action. People were running to raise money for charities; something that Luke thought was often a waste of money on the part of the donors. A lot of them paid massive salaries to their executives and from Luke's experiences of contacting charities that were supposed to provide local courses for young people - and who were even officially recognized and referred to by the local council - they were far from impressive. They never got back to Luke after he sent them a form. For many, charity was a way to ease their conscience once or twice a year. They would throw a load of money at a problem and then hope people would stay out of sight and out of mind. Charities portray people as helpless and of course before women gained equality they often had to rely on charity - it was not a dignified affair, and no one should have to beg to get what they need, Luke thought.

Runners in Lycra singlets with three digits printed on their apparel were doubling over near the finish line, struggling for breath. Thousands upon thousands of people were all over the roads and the streets; but Luke noticed very few were going in any restaurants or takeaways. Even a major event like a marathon could not shake Woecaster out of its recession. There seemed to be a conformism at work, perhaps based on the notion that runners do not indulge in fatty foods. Luke was not a big fan of restaurants himself for reasons already elucidated but it was odd so few people were eating anywhere. The main thing he wondered was what would become of all these establishments. It seemed everything was getting quieter at weekends, too, and there had been so many closures and re-brandings as of late.

No matter how much one worried about it there was little that could be done, not without a major sea change. The primary and secondary sectors of the economy, or as the layperson may call them farming and manufacturing, were in a great decline. The service sector was growing but many of the jobs it created were low-paid and easily outsourced. Employees in primary and secondary sector jobs were understandably spending less than they had used to when the economy was more dynamic. It was no doubt an inevitability that the United Kingdom would not forever remain rich. Sadly even the expanding service sector offered little hope - whatever else new workers in these jobs could boast of it was certainly not a heavy wage packet. So much of the country's wealth had been built many years ago on the backs of slaves bought from Africa, and from countries' resources pillaged during the building of an empire. Perhaps then it was simply facing an inevitable decline. The United Kingdom had always been a lazier nation than Germany, the Netherlands or France. It had succeeded in the past most probably because of its geographic luck - its position meant it had a naval advantage. Now, the long and methodical approach of the Germans and the other continental Europeans was paying off; there was no hiding behind shoddy economics now that old colonies from European empires had gained their independence and hard work and innovation were what mattered.

All things considered Luke would have liked to have changed the United Kingdom a great deal. He would have limited expenditure on firework displays - why was it that when they were arranged, while wonderful, they had to go on for up to thirty minutes? Luke loved bright lights as much as anyone but five minutes was as good as thirty - if not better. Sometimes less is more. He would have allowed children a say on which teachers were employed in schools. They had a marvellous knack of sussing out the good and the bad ones, not to mention the nicknames they came up with. The thought struck him that it might be worthwhile to limit the ticket prices football teams could charge at stadiums too: surely it was immoral for local teams to charge well above what many of the working class population there could afford for regular attendance. Had Luke been the well-connected type he may have made one of the most interesting politicians in history but he was not and so his ideas remained just that.

On most days before he went to college Luke would catch the train to Woecaster to enjoy city life a little. As he travelled a lot he observed the differences between different areas. The tesselations in the patterns of pavements varied according to which town he was in - that was one of the key discoveries he made. In Duldrum patterns were rather basic, generally perhaps square tiles or diamonds. In Hardock, halfway between Duldrum and Woecaster tiles were smaller and patterns altered more, with a kind of Celtic creativity. Woecaster was the best of the three, having tiles of many different kinds and colours and with very complicated patterns, that altered up to ten or more times on a pavement. The layouts of the tiles seem to reflect the people that surrounded him - in Duldrum more simple and uninspired, the further towards Woecaster more cosmopolitan and civilized. Though even Woecaster was a familiar dread to Luke; he could recall after having come back from a train ride to London once stepping off back into his home city. His feeling at the time was astonishment. Why had he never before noticed the architecture was all so huddled together, the tiles so dark; in London everything had been tall and streets had opened up into dizzying mosaics.