New Year, New Me

New year, new me. No more ‘middle-of-the-night gardening’ or ‘driving endlessly down country lanes looking for the perfect spot to hide my misdemeanours.’ Those days (years… let’s be honest, decades) are well and truly behind me. I’ve even tidied my shed and gotten rid of many of my ‘tools.’ Not all of them, mind you, but most. The ones that may tempt me back to the old days. The old me. The me that I’m not particularly fond of anymore. People still are, though. They still write books; I’m featured on the occasional true crime podcast, and I’ve even been the subject of a BAFTA award-winning documentary. I don’t often get embarrassed by my achievements, but the documentary was so well done it nearly brought a tear to my eye.

You may be wondering what brought on this sudden change of direction in life. What happened that made me wake up one morning and go, ‘Killing isn’t for me anymore.’ It’s not that I grew bored of it. I still enjoyed the stalking, the chase, and, let’s not beat around the bush, the torture and the eventual desecration of the human body. That still made me feel all warm and gooey inside.

So what was the reasoning behind ‘kicking my bad habit’? What was driving me to change my ways, to be a better me? I know there’s no hope of redemption for me. I crossed and burned that bridge long ago. No matter how much good I do in society with my remaining years, it won’t even touch the bad that I’ve done. I don’t mean that in a sarcastic or regretful way. I’m quite honest when I say I don’t regret a single life I took or the pain I inflicted. Why would I? What purpose would it serve? And more to the point, why would I regret my life’s work? I ‘bloody’ enjoyed it. If I hadn’t enjoyed it so much, I would have given up killing decades ago.

But this still leads me to my burning question. What is driving ‘A New Year, A New Me’? I pondered this question so much I’ve almost given myself a semi-permanent headache. I walked miles and miles, took bus journeys to places I can’t remember, just to ponder that very question.

With utmost confidence, I can say I’m not bored of killing people, and I’ve definitely not grown a conscience, nor am I regretting my actions of the last decade (or more). Then what is this annoying, deep-seated feeling I have in my bones and blackened soul that no longer wants to stalk, kidnap, torture, maim, and kill innocent people?

Maybe, and I’m pulling at straws here, but perhaps I’ve reached my full potential. I’ve effectively reached the uppermost level of being a murderer. I don’t particularly like the term ‘murderer’ for what I do. It’s an art in my eyes. I’m a conductor of Pain and Misery. I don’t particularly like the term ‘serial killer,’ although that’s what the media call me. But that term doesn’t encapsulate my work at all. If anything, it demeans it and that of my participants, or I suppose you’d call them victims. But I think that’s a derogatory word and doesn’t do justice once more to my work. So, I guess I have to settle for ‘murderer.’ It’s a bit plain and misses the point entirely. But it will have to do. I can’t see anyone else coming up with an alternative and more suitable term. If I can’t, and I class myself as superior in intellect to most of society, then no one can.

The next part of the equation of ‘A New Year, A New Me’ is what do I do now if I don’t do what I’m extremely good at and essentially enjoy doing when I don’t really enjoy doing it anymore? I know that doesn’t make sense, but to me, it does, and I suppose if I’m being brutally honest, it’s my opinion that matters the most. You may have an opinion, but I suggest you keep it to yourself. Not that I’d take you to my shed, tie you to a chair, slowly blowtorch your eyes from your skull, and then disembowel you with my rusty garden shears. I still have my shed but no longer have a blowtorch or rusty garden shears. Too much of a temptation. I’m trying to be a good boy and all. ‘New Year, New Me,’ let’s not forget.

If I’m not being a conductor of Pain and Misery, I need something else to give me undivided attention and passion. Something that gives me the same warm and gooey feeling that taking the lives of my participants in twisted yet very creative ways did. Even now, when I look back at my past ‘murders,’ I marvel at how creative I was. It aggrieves me that they don’t give out awards for this kind of stuff.

I’ve thought about hobbies that men of my age partake in that I could focus on. Become obsessed with and devote wasted hours to. The first thing I thought of was golf. The exercise was sufficient, and it would be good to meet new people.But then I saw a temptation in golf that could lead me back to my old ways. The golf club. That little weapon I’ve used many times over the years on my participants. It was a very effective weapon for torture and ultimately delivering the final death blow. So, golf’s out of the question. Too many pretentious middle-aged men was too much of a temptation for me. I’m determined to stay on track. ‘I shall not be tempted by thy wicked misgivings!’

Another avenue was snooker. As a youth, I always found it quite therapeutic and relaxing. At one with the table and the cue. But there, temptation lies again in waiting. Two implements of torture and maiming straight away. The cue (I’ve broken a few heads and bones with that over the years, come to think of it, I think I rammed one down a man’s throat once, handle first of course) and the snooker balls themselves. Those beauties crack fingers and toes like they do when I crack an egg to make an omelette. So, snooker, along with golf, are strict no-gos.

I do have an alternative hobby that I could focus on. One that I could completely obsess over and ultimately get creative satisfaction from. I do believe it’s quite popular with the youth of today, and it happens that my mother and grandmother also participated in this hobby.

Knitting.

Yes, knit one, pearl one.

That knitting.

I can just see myself with my nice chair sat by dim lamp light, knitting away to some classical music or radio play. Knitting a multitude of fancy and diverse scarfs, mittens, and jumpers to sell at the local market or on Etsy, perhaps. Now, what material shall I knit with? I don’t want to be a bore and use boring old wool. That’s not creative at all. Everyone knits with wool. I want to be different. I want to work with a material that’s durable, stretchy, and awe-inspiring, one that will bring tears to people’s eyes and make them utterly emotional.

The only material I can think of working with is easily sourced and environmentally friendly. I just need to find the right particpants who are willing to part with their skin. That may be tricky, but I can be very persuasive.

I suppose this year isn’t so ‘New Year, New Me’ but more ‘New Year, Old Me!’