case study

Syd Barrett (an artist)  —  image source

Illustrating the principle that most days it’s not worth not getting out of bed of a morning, artist Duggie Fields recounts the disintegration of his former flatmate Syd Barrett, who was a co-founding member of ‘legendary’ rock band Pink Floyd:

I think he spent quite a while lying in bed. I used to be in the next room and I’d be painting... And I knew he was lying in bed sort of thinking — my [speculative] interpretation was that he was thinking — that, while he lay there, he had the possibility of doing anything in the world that he chose. But the minute he made a choice, he was limiting his possibilities. So he lay there as long as he could — so he had this unlimited future! But, of course, that’s a very limited present, when you do that, and a very depressing one ultimately.

• interviewed for the film The Pink Floyd and Syd Barrett Story (Otmoor Productions Limited, 2003)

Still, surely that kind of thing can’t hurt in moderation. So maybe next time you have a lie-in and arrive late for work, tell your employer it was imperative for you to maximise your possibilities. If you have a heartless philistine of a boss who just doesn’t get it, maybe it’s time to move on...?

Duggie Fields (an artist)  —  screencap by jarcob