I was contemplating the subtle late August/early September shift as I counted four squished slugs on the narrow path to the big Sainsburys – how I couldn’t quite pin that shift down, whether it was a quality of the light or a thinness in the air or whether it was actually me as I shifted into the Autumn of my life; how my recent embrace of the term’ “late summer” was a sign of me being in denial? But then I saw a headline in an algorithmic feed – DWAYNE JOHNSON HAS LOST 60LBS! The melange of influencers, the celebrity commentariat and wrestling dirt sheets was ablaze with takes: He’s going for serious roles now! He did it for Scorcese! A man in his fifties can’t carry that much muscle, it’s a burden that the heart cannot bear! I just wondered where that 60lbs of Dwayne Johnson had gone. Is Dwayne Johnson a variation of the ship of Theseus where a plank is shed at every port and never replaced? Maybe a tiny, 60lb Dwayne Johnson will show up and declare that he is actually the true, essential Dwayne Johnson and the bigger Dwayne Johnson is actually the shell that he cast aside? You might say that Dwayne’s brain could only live in one vessel but what if his hemispheres were also split during the great shedding? But if that was the case, only one of them would have the gift/curse of language and the only way to truly tell them apart would be to place them in opposing kitchens and smell what they are cooking. I can’t even recognise my own authentic selfhood, let alone choose from two from a fractal of voices and vantages that claim to be the essential Niall. I once dropped my phone in the toilet but I never managed to drop 60lbs. Oh Dwaynes, we love you, pair up!
05/09/25
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