Coffee and Chameleons
A suitcase of secrets
I saw this and … although it‘s a bit sad insofar as two of them died … overall, there’s a happy ending to the tale really — they were nearly all rescued after all.
However, more to the point, I want a suitcase full of chameleons now.
Not for any specific reason … just to carry around with me.
I imagine going about my day in the post-Covid world … when the city is once again teeming with millions of people … imagine getting on and off buses and tube (subway) trains … walking along the street … going in and out of shops … sitting in cafés, bars, restaurants, wherever … maybe taking some time out to rest on a bench in a park and contemplate … all the time aware that … if only they knew … people would probably look at me very differently: who carries a suitcase full of chameleons around with them … what is he intending to do with them … what are they for … why are they in a suitcase … why … ?
And all the while aware that the strangest answer of all … the one nobody would suspect … or understand … is the simple truth that I like having a suitcase of chameleons about my person — it’s just good to know that, wherever I am … whatever I am doing … a sizeable number of chameleons is close by.
I could … at any moment … open the suitcase and let them out … and there’d be pandemonium, chameleons everywhere, startled people jumping with alarm, screams and shouts, children and, maybe, dogs chasing them this way and that, adding to the excitement and confusion, a symphony of riotous chameleonic colour, with me the conductor of chaos.
I could do it any time … perhaps today … perhaps right now … right here — today is as good a day as any other to open a suitcase and release a flood of chameleons, like a rainbow waterfall, upon an unsuspecting world.
“Today in the city there was uproar as up to a hundred chameleons overran a department store. Police are currently investigating but, so far, have unearthed no clue as to the owner of the suitcase from which the colourful reptiles escaped.”
But not now …. not here … not today … I think I’ll hang on to them a little longer. Because I like having a suitcase full of chameleons — I feel more alive on the cusp of potential effortlessly unleashed with the mere flip of hasp and lid, all I’ve got to do is open the suitcase and …
But no … perhaps I’ll do it another day. For now I’ll just quietly sit here and think about it … sip my coffee, smile to myself … because I have a suitcase full of chameleons … and nobody would ever suspect it — it’s my secret … mine and the chameleons’.
