Jonathan Dodd‘s latest column. Guest opinion articles do not necessarily reflect the views of the publication. Ed
I want to raise a cheer for guilty pleasures. I don’t mean illegal stuff, or things you do that are actually stupid or dangerous or just bad for you, and I don’t mean things you get addicted to that might do you harm, in any of so many ways that we can damage ourselves. I mean the things that we love to do for whatever reason that we probably feel a bit embarrassed about, and tend to keep to ourselves for fear of ridicule.
When I was a lot younger than I am now, I began to fear exposure. Not in the way of being found with no clothes on in public or anything like that, but because I felt that a lot of the thoughts I was having were somehow bad. Much of this was before I finally kicked out all that religious guilt I was nearly buried in.
Either Doctor or Mr Spock
For instance, as a child I was expected to say my prayers, first with my mother in the room making sure I included everyone and didn’t say anything disrespectful to God, and then on my own, with the fear of unknown consequences if I didn’t.
This wasn’t done with any bad intentions. It was before the age of either Doctor or Mr Spock, and child psychology was completely unknown. It was just because it was somehow expected. I can still remember the sleepless night I spent after refusing to say prayers any more, because I wasn’t absolutely sure that I wasn’t going to be smitten in the night.
That would have been such an embarrassment
I imagined bolts of lightning and a small charred body underneath a mysteriously-intact eiderdown for some hours, before inevitably falling asleep. The next morning was one of the best of my life. I felt like I had passed an important exam, and I knew I had learned a very great lesson about not taking for granted what people tell you and the importance of thinking for yourself.
I also promised any future children I might have that I would never allow them to go through the same ordeal for nothing. Many years later, when I thought I was dying, I was glad to realise that I had no thought in my mind about praying in that last-ditch insurance way after not giving it any serious thought for the whole of one’s life. That would have been such an embarrassment.
Working out what was true or useful
I’m not saying that religion isn’t important to me though. My beliefs are deep and solid and private, and I’m still working out how I can start my own church, mentioned in a previous blog. But that’s for another day.
Anyway, it took a long time to go through all the other received wisdom drummed into me during my childhood and working out what was true or useful before discarding all the rest, and it took longer still to feel confident as a person out there among others, at least confident enough to reveal stuff that I had previously kept hidden.
In case something slipped out
It got to such a stage that I became wary of saying anything at all in case something slipped out and people might mock me, and I noticed that I was becoming far too guarded in my speech, which made everything awkward and not enjoyable.
So I embarked on the risky strategy of telling everyone everything about which I might have felt worried on the principle that if everyone knew everything then the whole fear of exposure would be a bit redundant. And amazingly nobody seemed to care. Or even better, they revealed the same sort of fears themselves.
About which we might be a little embarrassed
Anyway, the guilty pleasures I seem to have strayed so far from are much more in the way of innocent delight got from the indulgence of whims and small longings and pleasures that are accessible or maybe forgotten from the past, and about which we might be a little embarrassed.
I confess to a terrible inability to leave a packet of dark chocolate digestives unconsumed, even if it makes me ill. You already know about the Hawaiian shirts. I really enjoy the occasional Werther’s Original, sucked slowly. I like Jean Michel Jarre. I adore You’ve Been Framed, which makes me laugh louder and harder than almost anything else. And I have a strange partiality for University Challenge. I like Kraftwerk and Lee Ritenour, and The Streets. And I’ve recently rediscovered cheese scones, which I eat with lots of butter.
Even thinking about cheese scones makes my mouth water. I’ve got to go and find one. Right now.
If you have been, thank you for reading this.
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