Author: davidjohntooth

Liam Payne died at the age of just thirty-one years, a young man who appeared to have achieved everything he dreamed about in his life.

Even at a very young age he knew what he wanted from life and music like art is so fulfilling if you become good at it.

As part of One Direction a group of young singers in just a few years they became a global sensation, adored by both girls and boys they achieved vast amounts of money and multiple properties in different countries.

But read between the lines and the life he thought he wanted never became the Holy Grail instead he apparently spent lonely nights in hotel rooms with only the room bar for company. A room bar never passes judgment but has no stop sign either. Always pick a dream you can never achieve because it’s never about the finish line, but about enjoying the journey through life that’s important, and if you don’t enjoy the journey change the route.

While in Birmingham I spent fifteen minutes looking around BHS which had a range of decorative products, ceramics, towels, cushions, mostly things that you didn’t need to change but became seduced by small incremental changes in colour or design making them must-have items.

Eventually I decided to ignore all of them, leaned against a steel support pillar and got comfortable as I waited for my wife to tire herself out as she continually passed by me as if she were on a merry-go-round.

Then I watched and marveled at all the different types of people and the clothes they wore, each one trying to be that one human that was different too anyone else. Some do it by writing a bestseller, becoming the greatest sportsman or woman, or the next Elvis; but the way we dress has the most initial impact on our senses.

And how I would have loved some of those clothes when I was eighteen; a period when nearly everything was black and white.

It’s not very often that I go to Birmingham now mainly because it has become so busy; adding to the amount of people bustling around is the noise level; but not just from the crowds but more from street artists armed with high-powered amplifying systems that could possibly burst eardrums if you got to close and stayed to long.

Then there are the preachers of every religion who pace up and down trying and in most cases failing to hold a steady audience, but this never seems to bother any of them as they appear completely oblivious to what is happening in the world around them.

As my body is now reaching the point at which it was designed to fail I have started to look at various religions in case I can find an oppt out clause.

I noticed that some types of Bubdbhism think that when a person dies eventually the soul is reincarnated into a new body.

I thought that sounded quite promising but then I noticed that it stated when a person dies the soul passes through the head. I have now stopped wearing a hat.

I sat in the book shop Waterstones and had a coffee then thought back to when the shop had the most amazing top floor where it was possible to spend hours sitting on comfortable sofas reading the vast array of magazines.

Primark turned all that area into a clothes store. You don’t realize what you’ve got until It’s gone.

And I let Her Go.

It’s not surprising that Taylor Swift backed Kamala Harris in the presidential election as a lot of her values are the same as the vice president and it shows a very courageous person.

Most famous people would think twice about putting their head above the parapet and becoming a target for abuse or worse and she would have thought carefully about this before committing. So well done Taylor.

I am quite biased regarding music mainly because having lived through the fifties and sixties I considered that period the most innovative period for different genres of it.

However I quite like some of Taylor Swift’s songwriting and the way the videos are put together, that is one definite improvement from when music first started.

The Beatles made great music but as Mick Jager said ‘They couldn’t dance’

After millions of years, we seem to have learned very little about how to live peacefully with other human beings, and with the advent of ever more destructive weapons; the amount of people being killed has probably far exceeded that of a few centuries ago plus now we can cover vast distances in just a few hours, so now no area in the world is safe from the possibility of being destroyed.

Children hold the key to the future of the world, but that offers no protection from being killed at a young age.

Imagine There’s No Heaven Thanks John

It’s funny that even though I was always into music I still find songs on YouTube that are classics but for some reason passed over my head or have gone to the back of my mind. Came across one of Reo Speed wagon’s tracks ‘Can’t Fight This Feeling’ Try and find the Spanish Video which revolves around the romance between a boy and a girl. It is quite special, don’t forget the red wine. Wonder if the Group wants an eighty-two-year-old Roadie? I would accept minimum wage.

Such a shame that Micheal Mosely died while holidaying on a small Greek island, but the way he died is surprising. He always appeared to think problems through before taking any chances so why did he go walking when the temperature was about forty degrees with just water and an umbrella for shade but crucially no phone.

Many people stated he would leave his phone behind because that gave him a little oasis, a brief spell of serenity and I can understand that. It could be that he intended to only walk for a short distance and then felt so good that he continued without realizing he had walked much farther than he had intended and suddenly started to dehydrate. So do you walk further or try to retrace your previous route.

It all comes back to the one thing we all do throughout our lives; Make mistakes. The survivors are the ones who make the right decisions.

How quickly they come around but my theory is that time in-between birthdays is approximately relative to the years of your life, so when you are two, time passes twice as fast as when you are one. This is quite worrying because I was eighty-two yesterday so I can’t afford to blink or I will miss a whole year.

My Daughter, son-in-law, and youngest granddaughter Daisy who is sixteen came down from Manchester and took us to Ashwoods Garden Centre which is about a forty-minute drive from where we live. It’s my favorite one with a nice collection of plants and a lovely restaurant that serves simple but excellent food; a place that never gets too crowded.

There is an amazing garden(Johns Garden) that spreads over a large distance; there is an entrance fee of £7.50 but it is worth every penny and I believe the money goes to research for the treatment of brain cancer as one of the young staff (John) died from this terrible disease.

I just blinked so I will have to check what year it is.

Theoretically, it’s the middle of summer in the UK so we should be experiencing global warming, but it’s definitely not happening here. Well, to be fair we are getting rain; usually for six out of the seven days in the week, and even the day without rain is cloudy.

And it’s so cold, with many households using their central heating when the reverse should be happening and cooling systems should be switched on.

My garden is not very big, but a small oasis, surrounded by Accers, most in pots but the larger ones growing in the ground, mingled in-between are different types of hydranger’s and star Jasmin, all of them have grown taller and faster than previous years, but without the warmth from the Sun they are refusing to open and many of the shrubs have grown so tall that I have continuously pruned them.

I noticed that it’s over twelve years since Passenger produced the iconic song LET HER GO ( 1.5 billion views on the internet). I remember hearing it for the first time as I walked through a large retail store in Birmingham. I immediately stopped and listened as the tune and lyrics took me back to bittersweet moments in my life, pivot points, that could have taken my pathway through it in different directions and I always wonder if that would have been an improvement or a disaster. Perhaps its best not to think to deep.

Some weekends late in the evenings I pour myself a glass of red wine, put on the most amazing headphones that my children bought me, link them up to You Tube and imerse myself in musical videos that take the years away back to when I was starting out in life with no sat nav to guide me and no post code to put in it. Winging it.

I was sixteen, in a cafe with a friend waiting for a plate of chips, he put some money in the juke box and pressed play, the robotic arm hovered over a disk then uneringly placed it on the turntable and the mixture that represented Bird Dog drifted to every corner of the room, searching for suitable host’s.

Twenty one Great Yarmouth, She Was Just seventeen;Forteen Rocking Through the Rye; Hunters hill open air school. The first time I heard the word Rock in music. Music is the most reliable timepiece; but if anyone has a spare rolex I am willing to use it as a back up.