I was minded to hark back to 1988 this morning, when Enya's Orinoco Flow popped up on the ipod. As early adopters of this blog will know, I'm an Enya fan. I especially love this record.
It reminds me, actually, of not the best period of my life, where I was more or less homeless living on friend's floors until the flat I was going to move to became available. It sounds more dramatic than it was, as I never found myself on the streets as such, however I was often wondering where the next roof was likely to be. Thankfully this was only for a couple of months.
This song, then, reminds me of flatsitting for a friend who'd won a competition prize of a two week holiday in Barbados. So while he sunned himself there, I got the flat that had no heating or hot water, no bathroom, over-looked a graveyard, with use of a washing machine owned by highly-strung woman upstairs (perhaps just piling in my washing without asking and accidentally picking up a screwdriver with that load meant she did have grounds to shout after me all the way to the Tube station). And it was in Leyton, east London. And it was cold. But it did have a gas fire and a big colour TV, and on this TV I first saw Enya doing Orinoco Flow, and instantly loved the song.
So I went to my 1988 playlist and found other songs reminding me of this period: Need You Tonight by INXS, Je Ne Sais Pas Porquoi by Kylie, to name but a few. They do take me right back. I look back and marvel at how useless I was, knowing I had to leave one flat and find another, and not finding one but living on floors and getting on people's nerves. I lived all over London. In two months, I think I lived in five diferent places. This time 20 years ago all I had were the clothes I stood up in, with any possessions stashed all over town. God I was hopeless.
Nothing's changed. Just ask Mrs F-C.
