I know that we've come back here to the Theatre Of The Mind but if we pass through and down the stairs to an unassuming looking door, we step out into a corridor which on side is the undressed rock of the island and on the other, a wall and a set of quadruple glazed windows. If we turn to our left and head down the corridor, we'll pass through another set of doors and into a building of sorta which has also been cut into the side of the island.
We're looking for Room 2219.
Shutting the door behind us, I now want you to take note of what you can hear. Do you hear that? What is it? You can't hear anything? Do you know why you can't hear anything? Because there are no sounds to be heard.
If you look out of the window (which as a quadruple glazed window is always closed), then the only thing that you can see from here is the grey sea and a slightly different blue-grey sky. Occasionally there will be heavy rains which lash the window and maybe there will be storms which brew somewhere out there but from here, it is impossible to see very much of anything, ever.
The reason why I have brought you to this room, which is only furnished with a bookshelf of commonplace books, a desk, a notepad, and a radio which is only ever set to AM 1737kHz, is to do with the nature of my internal monologue.
The radio can not ever be turned off; nor can it be ever set to another station. It might occasionally play static, or perhaps the memory of some music from oh so long ago, but it is always my own voice.
I work in this office alone, with the door closed often. There are sounds which float down the corridor and naturally there can be tension from the world which is outside but the point is that everything happens out there somewhere. I can not definitively know what lies outside or even if it exists but I trust that it does.
I know that this sounds probably trite but I think that I have experienced enough of life to say that even though storms might come, I think that I have enough of a rock fortress that unless there is complete and utter catastrophic calamity, I will not be shaken.
I have seen people die. I have been pushed beyond the point of sensibility by employers and have worked beyond midnight. I have been held to answer for other people's actions before a panel. I have seen the inside of court rooms. I have been physically injured. I have been stuck on the other side of the world wondering why I hadn't been paid and with less than £10 in my pocket. I have been teased mercilessly, been punched, have walked out of a national park after falling down a cliff and landing in a river, and have been left behind in a national park by people who should have been looking out for me.
Apart from death, I do not know what else life can throw at me.
At the moment, the view from the office of the island fortress looks uncertain but not ridiculous.
If anything, Covid-19 rather than making me either alarmed or fearful (though being prudent and alert is wise), has made me bored. There is almost no point watching the news anymore because there is no news. The Coronavirus has infected all of the news and because there's no sport, there's also no light relief either. My alarms and fears are invested in watching and looking out for what happens to other people and more importantly, making sure that I continue to look outward from the fortress of my mind, upon storms over the ocean.
Now that we've seen this office, I think it worthwhile that we walk back through the theatre and back up and into the City of Sealand.
On the Northside side of the island is a power station which is powered by hopes, a small amount of insanity, quite a lot of quiet contemplation, ideas which are shipped in, and the workforce is fortified with cups of tea and black coffee.
There is very little in the world which is not improved by a cup of tea. Boring meetings, the end of church services, sport that takes hours, reading through documents, reading novels, or simply a pleasant afternoon - all are improved with the addition of a cup of tea. I am convinced that the best empires in history (namely the various Chinese, Mongolian, Japanese, British, and Indian etc.) see all able to extend their limits wider still and wider because of the ability to have tea. The modem British Army is the best army in the world because every tank has what's known as a Boiling Vessel (BV) on board which enables every crew of a British tank to have a cup of tea wherever they are. I think that every decent fortress of the mind should have access to cups of tea - they function better.
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