pages 77 -81

Alice decided that sometimes The Duchess just let the big pig muck around under her enormous skirt, whilst The Duchess arched her neck and mumbled soft noises, the likes of which Alice could not even imagine. Alice decided that the “V” at the front of The Duchess’s dress was a little doorway. Perhaps the duchess was always dropping her food so that someone further down could have a feed.
Alice began to look at The Duchess in a new way. Each time The Duchess exhorted her to watch her p’s and Q’s and carried on about how appropriate companions could be selected by observing people’s cutlery use, Alice began to watch for a subtle arch of the neck or the big pig’s tail peeking out from the hem of her skirt.


Alice began to read between the lines.
Rinse again
Open the door
Don’t let the dust gather
Don’t sit still


“I see a pattern said the caterpillar”, who was earning some cash in hand as a psychotherapist phD ADHD.
“No,” said Alice, “I told you about the pattern. The pattern is the problem. Its going to take over the world, beginning with each centimeter of my mind and then working outwards.”
“Let’s try hypnosis”, said the Caterpiller, “Then I’ll sleep with you whilst you’re under and all you angst can be transferred to that issue and you can forget about the patterns. Problem Solved!”


All I have to do is disrupt the patterns, thought Alice. That bloody caterpillar must be a Freudian psycho. She shuddered but held her own. She was beginning to expect the worst and she was still only 24. (Fairly wealthy though, having received the baby bonus 856 times.)


There were factories pumping out repetitive shapes and patterns and patterns of people of all shapes buying them, discarding them and then beginning again. Then there was the disrupted pattern made formless by the forms which were no longer in a pattern. But still it was a pattern because there are plenty of formless things around to make patterns with. Like checks inside checks, double entendres, ironies and palindromes and paradigms. There were, even though obviously unregulated, parts of life that made patterns of their own. There were patterns that everyone was able to observe other people participating in, unaware that they themselves were part of the pattern of watchers.
“Here, suck on this and the patters will alter” said the caterpillar.
Others could see patterns in tea-leaves and some people could read patterns where the cloth on your dress wears thin. They could read between the lines made by the threads and they could also see through them. Alice clutched at the pieces of her that she didn’t want others to see through her dress. Unfortunately she only had two hands to clutch with and three pieces to hide.