Watching a film made for the BBC the interviewer Emily Maitles, who often presents BBC's News Night took us through the glitzy world of Donald Trump. This was Trump before he became mired in his attempt to become the President of the United States.
I have always eschewed extravagance, the overt over the top lifestyles, the glamour of exclusivity. Perhaps it was a method of inoculating myself mentally from something I was never going to aspire to.
It's a method I have used all my life. Never browse through adverts for things which are out of reach, have the ability to see yourself as who you are, warts and all, and rather be the plebeian down to earth chap who sees value not in a things price tag but in its utility.
Donald Trump is none of these things.
He is the ultimate showman, he wheels and deals, he creates a world in his own image 'where what you are is only what others see'.
Ruthless, he sits atop of a world where he disdains most people for not being as rich as he is, for not flaunting your wealth in the way he does, for not branding the world with the name Trump.
It's easy to see how he has got himself into political hot water. His world is entirely of his own making, what he wants he gets, one way or another. The hubris of a presidential candidate is dwarfed by his hubris of believing in who he is. The fact that I don't like what I see is irrelevant in his world of mirrors in which he only sees himself.
The sheer opulence of his creations, the price tag for only one night, well beyond my means makes his world phoney in the sense that it is and will always be un-affordable to most of us. The distance between my portion of the planet and his has to be dealt with by my declaring it false, contrived, artificial but of course if I were extremely wealthy perhaps I would try it out, perhaps I would go in for some pampering but when I came to write my blog at night, I doubt if the gold plated bath tap would feature in my stories.
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