The gin soaked axioms

THE GIN SOAKED AXIOMS, OR IN VINO LIES ARTISTIC VERITAS.

1. If the Heavens aren't good, muses Cathy after work the next day, what are people? Wicked, when Cathy thinks of Alice taped or Alice despairing over injustice and abuse. Cathy bounces indignantly and changes her posture in the chair, Alice is human, just as human as Bill or Herrick and Cathy had thought something a bit weird was going on the way they all talked past Alice. Slap up against conniving cruelty! Cruelty? Cathy is taken aback, but, yes, cruelty it is.

2. It is dark outside, an early October darkness and the rushing cold is full of dead leaves. Frog's out there, getting away with it. So are Lemon Pip, Herrick and Bolt, if this is how they intend to run the world it's about time women were put in charge!

3. But not women like Martha, who has rejected Cathy, the phone sits silent. Cathy would bloody well like to ring Bill and tell him off but Derek, her live in partner, says that would be patronising. Cathy mustn't fight Alice's battles for her.

4. Cathy jumps up and rights a framed cartoon, which is hanging crookedly. But Alice is plainly mad, and cannot take care of herself. Cathy's heart swells at the thought of Alice suffering all too palpable injustices at the hands of her fellow human beings. Cathy would like to put that straight, she has always championed under dogs.

5. Cathy cannot imagine how Alice feels, nor why her illness makes her so rude and angry. Sorry, no! Cathy can imagine how Alice feels and why she rebels, Cathy has peeped into the abyss as every man and woman on earth has at some time, add to that vilification? For a second Cathy's heart lurches with dread of madness in herself. She knows it, she denies it, denial is instinctive, the abyss is dreadful. She pushed her specs up the bridge of her nose, deciding this calls for a gin and tonic, perhaps she'll find normality in the kitchen with the gin.

6. Settled again and sipping, Cathy pulls the thought of her secret, denied understanding out of her head. Accustomed to think in tactile images, it is as if it is in her hands now, dreadful but held out for scrutiny in the electric light. It is a little bunched up, bawling idea and Cathy's long fingers and palms tingle, Raku clay could be worked to represent this, a crude, potent figurine could be formed in Raku textures, small but terrible. A Dread, a Dread expressing what Cathy dreads in its lineaments – Cathy is sweating slightly, she is intent – Bolt and Co must also dread their own awareness of the abyss. It is so quiet as Cathy sits and sips her gin, the hum of the refrigerator can be plainly heard from the kitchen.

7.Cathy stirs, she cannot keep up this intensity of thought. It is nine o'clock, her worst moments are passing, she will talk to Alice again, Alice is a victim of injustice and if the Heavens aren't good, people should try to be. This brings Cathy back full circle to her fury at the neglect and sidelining Alice suffers from Lemon Pip and Co.

8. People joke about this, ill informed and laughing at what they fear as they all demonstrate their niceness and normality to each other, united against the Other, against Them like a playground clique finding solidarity in laughing at the scapegoats. Even the Party newspaper, which ought to have some claim to right thinking – if they want my bloody vote they'll have to try harder – thinks Cathy, forgetting she has never voted any other way in her adult life. Then she remembers and it makes her grin. Is there any alternative? But is it a choice between the vindictiveness that closes hospitals and turns the sick onto the streets, and the not-my-business attitude of the opposition party? Cathy feels sick, abuse makes sure no-one dares to stick up for the abused.

9. Under dogs have always moved Cathy and made her their champion – what was Alice's phrase? - Human garbage. But whether physically or mentally impaired, no human being is garbage, the Catholic church has got that right! People are people are people, it hurts Cathy enough to make her cry for the hurts and cruelties, it frightens her, her deepest beliefs are threatened by her very own culture. Definitely a terrible weight on her spine, making it bumpy and rigid until once again she reaches into the darkness where the oppressive weight crushes her down, and pulls the bawling, bunched up Dread in front of her in the electric light. Bastard! Horrible little bastard frightening and oppressing her, and she is a Bird Woman of course with a long neb or beak wanting to find things out. Cathy can see her way to some preliminary sketches, she could get on with them tomorrow after work, she's tired now from intensive thinking.

10.All of a sudden, the spell breaks, Cathy has thought of Alice via herself and it has changed Cathy. Like powerful magic, a sympathetic imagination has given her the Dread and Bird Woman figures, shining with so much realisation, her hands will know what to do when they clutch Raku clay, if she can get those sketches right tomorrow evening. Or is Cathy suffering from gin on an empty stomach? She hasn't eaten, well she can't be arsed to cook, toast spread with the blackberry and apple jam she made will do, two slices. Cathy will befriend Alice, remember what Derek says but really, she thinks with a little smile, it's amazing what and who you can find fallen by the wayside! Cathy stands up, rights herself, and carries her empty glass into the kitchen.