daishin and greum maol stevenson in Wyndford. Photo: Chris Leslie
Today The Guardian has a photoessay by Chris Leslie about the demolition of the Wyndford high flats, with quotes from tenants including daishin and me.
In response to the questions I sent Glasgow Housing Association (soon to be renamed Wheatley Homes Glasgow), I received the following letter today. Decide for yourself how many of the questions it answers.
I remarked today to a fellow tenant (or “customer,” as you call us) that communicating with Cube is a bit like praying. But then I corrected myself, because when praying we do not know for certain that no one is listening or that our supplications will be ignored — which we can be certain of when communicating with you.
A few years ago I read a personal essay by the author of a popular book in the “misery memoir” genre. In the essay, the author described their lowest moment as being when they were jogging past a McDonald's and saw the employees watching and laughing. The author was horrified that “even” people working at McDonald's felt able to mock them. If only those proles knew who they were laughing at!
This kind of grandiosity is, in my experience, more common among authors than not. I have long suspected that the reason authors are so self-important is that we know how unimportant our work really is.
If there is anything positive about the pandemic, it is that it brings home whose work really matters. You cannot eat books.