One of the exercises at the writing workshop I attended was to choose one of about five images and write about the secret hobby that the person in the picture spent their leisure time doing. The pictures included images of a woman with a young child, a crocodile wrestling Steve Irwin type, an old man on a bus and the picture I chose - a convict stood against a backdrop of a height chart. Below is the unedited version of what I wrote during the exercise.
The convict lived a fast paced, crime ridden existence. His time in prison had all been served as a result of guilty convictions for violent and heinous crimes against others. Armed robbery, assault and burglary where he had blindfolded and tied up his victims were characteristic of his ‘career’. His victims needed massive amounts of counselling to recover from their encounters with this warped individual. They suffered nightmares many years afterwards and he left a trail of ruined lives, shattered dreams and broken people behind him. He worked alone, preferring his own company, not wanting to share either the planning or the end result with others. His world was one of solitude, barely touched by the interference of other humans. He liked not to think about the feelings he might induce in other people, he preferred to dwell instead on the fruits of his labours, the satisfaction of a job well done and a well planned, executed and completed task finished, with due pride and gratification gained from it before moving on the planning stage of his next masterpiece.
He was not a chancer, he didn’t act with knee jerk reactions or see where the wind blew him next. All of his actions were premeditated and considered. He was of a methodical nature and truly considered his criminal activities to be his career, something he had honed and developed with experience and a will to improve on each new job. He researched and kept abreast of latest developments and techniques. He read widely around his subject and admired the work of other professionals in his field, taking tips from their successful crimes and finding ways to integrate those ideas into his own work. He considered watching programmes such as Crime Watch to be research and scoured the local newspapers for information on the criminal activities of others. He spent time sitting in the public gallery at the court, hearing how others had carried out their crimes, learning from their mistakes, pinpointing what they had done wrong in order to find themselves being convicted rather than walking free having created that elusive ‘perfect crime’.
But when his day’s work was over and his latest ‘job’ at the stage he wanted it to be he would dedicate his mind to his hobby. When he was doing time in jail his hobby had to be put on hold although he would spent endless hours laying on his bunk, staring at the ceiling and considering his next great work.
Perhaps it went back to his childhood, this near obsession with order, with schedules, with a definite end result to denote success. He had always enjoyed set tasks, things which had a clear ending and a purpose, a reason to be done. He was not a lover of anything abstract or random, he gleaned no pleasure from an activity without a clear purpose or something to show for it at the end. His father was an army man, who brought that same mentality home with him, barking orders, expecting results, timing and quantifying everything he did. Homework had to be completed to a set standard in a certain time. His mother ensured the house ran like clockwork with meals always on the table at mealtimes to the minutes. Days, weeks, months and years all ran to a definite beat and a great deal was made of achievement, results and obvious successes.
His hobby was approached with the same level of self discipline and planning. He worked hard on creating an individual and unique piece of work each time, all the while learning from previous endeavours and putting into practice new skills and techniques. He read magazines dedicated to his hobby, borrowed books from the library, alongside biographies of the Krays and accounts of the great train robbery. He belonged to various internet mailing lists and forums on his hobby, trading ideas, techniques and methods with people scattered across the globe. Just as the fruits of his criminal activities were evident in his home by way of a small token item stolen from each property he had burgled, kept displayed on his sideboard to be stroked, polished and cooed over he also had on display in his home examples of his projects done for leisure. He was as proud to display these badges of achievement as he was to buy his food shopping with the spoils of his latest haul, or invest properly for his pension with the money stolen from the shoebox under the bed that his latest elderly burglary victim had been saving for that same purpose.
It was not altogether surprising that such a person would enjoy this particular hobby. After all it took the same skills to plan and execute a robbery, gathering together the necessary equipment for the job, taking risks, having a creative, imaginative and focussed mind. It took a methodical approach, care, foresight and a clear picture of what the end result would be. He took pride in creating a piece of work that ably demonstrated just what effort had gone into it, he enjoyed the great satisfaction of seeing his dream become a reality and knowing that he was the puppeteer in the theatre he created, masterfully moving everything about to achieve his own aims. He watched his works of art come to life under his hands, taking immense satisfaction from the joy of creating, of being in charge, calling the shots, holding the script and knowing what happened next. He enjoyed the order, the scientific-ness of his pursuits. He got pleasure from seeing something fall into place exactly as he had planned.
His work had been widely recognised within both of his industry circles. His was a known profile within the criminal world, although not all of his crimes were officially attributed to him those in the know would be very aware of his stamp on a job. He had a certain trademark style that left victims and his peers in no doubt about who had ‘done’ the job. He often got inspiration from one area of his world crossing across to the other. Seeing inside the homes of his victims gave him ideas and starting points for his hobby. Working with intricate designs and following his own plans to the letter in his leisure time gave him he self discipline and mindset for carrying out his criminal activities - helping to relax and rejuvenate him and to centre his mind. Ironically it had been his first stint inside prison which had given him the bug for his hobby although he never shared that story of his initial inspiration when asked how he got into it, but it was sewing mail bags which gave him his first taste of a needle and thread and kick started his love and passion for cross stitch.
