SCHOOL ESSAY, 1985

Here is an essay I wrote in year 8F in high school, when I was 14. Which makes it 1985. I am currently planning a trip back to Malaysia for my 40th birthday in 2011 which has me looking at guidebooks on the area I spent three years of my childhood in.

"MY IDEAL ENVIRONMENT"

The environment I am about to write about is an environment I have lived in. I have lived in many environments but I find that none of them are as beautiful, fun and memorable as the tropical rainforests.

Those that I am talking of are the ones of Borneo, in Brunei. To live there is like a dream. It is my ideal environment.

Lets imagine a stroll through the jungle. Picture in your mind rich, green trees, clear streams, friendly Iban natives who still live in their ancient ways, and a smell of the jungle that is enough to recognise from the city.

The city is actually a large community or small town. It involves a few blocks of shops, hundreds of flashy cars, a market place.

The market place is no Rodeo Drive of Hollywood, I guarantee. It is a two story building with no glass in the windows and no proper doors. There are stray cats and dogs everywhere. There is insufficient light and lots of water on the ground. It may sound terrible but it is quite and experience!

If you are an 'expat' (white person from overseas), you usually live in a comfortable home with your own maid who lives downstairs or next door. For about $400 a month she will babysit, cook, clean, do your laundry.

There are clubs with swimming pools, golf courses, theatres, dining lounges, playgrounds, beaches, sporting activities, summer holiday activities, bars and restaurants all together.

In the centre of the capital city (Bandar Seri Begawan) is a beautiful mosque with a gold dome roof. As well as one of the richest palaces in the world belonging to the richest man in the world. The Sultan (King). He owns the richest land in the world (Brunei) which happens to be my ideal environment.

Here's a photograph of the entrance to Niah Caves, some of the biggest in the world and a spectacular sight. Have you ever heard of the famous 'Bird's Nest Soup?" Here is where they get the bird's nests.

Notice the beautiful rainforest in the background.

In the midst of the beautiful jungles are crystal clear, icy waterfalls which are very, very beautiful.

One of the favourite pastimes is the K.B. River. Many people enjoy boat rides upstream to the thick jungles. I and most people, liked to water ski on it. You have to be very brave as there are large crocodiles, sea snakes and jellyfish in it. Here is a photograph of my mother while she is skiing on the great river.

The sunsets in Brunei are supposed to be the most beautiful in the world. I have seen and believed.

Brunei is a very dirty country as well as a very beautiful country. Like I said it's a dream and my ideal environment.

A Malay woman. In many parts of the Jungle, the natives have become more civilised, receiving electricity, western food and other products eg. the bicycle in the background.

In the background, a beautiful mosque, belonging to the Sultan of Brunei. To him this place is old and old fashioned. His new palace is priceless..

* * * * *

Obviously things have changed since then, including my parochial views and privileged position in society, but one thing remains, my fondness for that period in my life. I was 9-12 years old, and it was the last years before my parent's divorce, and the weather was nice. Most of these photos are by my mum.

Stem the Tears

I haven't been outside once today, which for me, is weird. I think I'm forcing myself to stay away from the shops which are pret-ty scarey places on wet weekends. Yesterday i went to IKEA, on a rainy Saturday, say no more.

Today was more about your back to basics wet weekend pastimes. Rekindling marital bonds, reading, talking to my mum on the phone for an hour.

My daughter and I decided to make some more mini-purses, they are basically ribbons folded in half with beaded sides. We made a basic one last week, today we embellished another one with a fringe. On the first purse I got her to paperclip it together, design all the ribbon/thread/bead combinations and did my best to hold my tongue, I can quickly lose my patience and she is quick to tears. I think we both tried hard and made it through. Today she was close to crying straight off the bat because she'd forgotten what she'd learnt.

We have a secret word that I say when she is about to cry when she can't do something. It is a dumb word with no relation to what we are doing except we both agree that it means "try not cry, lighten up" and she can use it back at me and it means "stop being mean, Mummy". Learning to sew, to use needle and thread is fraught with opportunities to give up, on both sides. Small steps, including a nap on my part mid-way, we got through.

Procrastinate Later

Something is going on today, some sticky chi is getting moved, is it the the extra coffee I had? I’ve opened Pandora’s box and in it is 74 undeveloped black and white films I have never got around to seeing what is on them. Years of hard work not wasted, hopefully. I finally feel the urge to get around to dealing with my neglected art.

There was that 5 year stint in the media that made me only live for the day and have the time to shoot/develop/upload the work I’d done that day. There was never enough time to go back and organise or rework the previous year’s efforts. There was only this rushing wave of ambition that headed in one direction - the future. Then there was the 7 year stint of full-time parenthood/part-time photographer. I could hardly string 10 full minutes together to gather my thoughts let alone create anything that took more than one fifteenth of a second.

Now the youngest child is at pre-school, I have three days a week to myself. I’ve had naps, watched ‘Cougar Town’, made elaborate salads, jogged with girlfriends, taken yoga classes, shopped, vacuumed, Facebooked, done laundry and sloughed my late thirties feet. But lately I have this hankering to actually do something about that nagging feeling called ‘my lost career’. It wasn’t really lost, it was just on the pause button.

There is a box of black and white film that dates back to 1991 that has been following me - it documents all the awful relationships I had, all the exotic places I went and now dream about, all the films I just couldn’t find the time to develop in my makeshift darkrooms in the bathrooms of Surry Hills or freezing laundry of Clovelly in the nineties, when I was holding down a day job and night school and shooting my heart out in between.

I’ve looked online and found my old favourite labs still open (surprisingly after the slaughterhouse of the Day of the Digital Camera) and I’ve got tomorrow pegged as lab drop-off and begin the process of exposing these little windows into my history.

I’m starting off cheap and cheerful by the seaside with Charing Cross Photo in Bronte at $6 a roll. But what I’d really prefer is the Blanco Negro hand job experience with a happy ending for $13.75 a roll

Heaven is Only 45 Minutes Drive Away

Yesterday we made it by dingy to Dangar Island. It was perfect, a shabby, beachfront holiday shack with an overgrown garden, friendly, down-to-earth folk, simple food, lots of children and sun and water. The view was glorious, looking south across the mighty Hawkesbury towards Cowan Waters. The tide was at maximum height but soon after we arrived it began receding off the beach and not long after some cherries and strawberries there was space to play.

We all swam in the warm, brown waters which I haven't enjoyed in many years. The children responded to my joy with double their own. We built a sandcastle Christmas Tree together, and decorated it with sticks and flowers, and they made rolled up balls of sand as 'presents' which we later 'opened' to reveal whatever their imaginations wanted - chocolates and bowling sets (!)

Lunch was delicious and simple, around a wooden table on the verandah. Salad, bbq sausages and garlicky potato salad, wine and the children eating cucumber! Near us the bucket of yabbies twitched. Grandad John joined us whilst Linda caught up on her sleep in the shaded hut.

We heard stories that had often breezed about Dangar Island - like the one about the Baron's Crescent bloke who drank two bottles of rum and started a third - his last, for he as not long in this world after that. Or the mysterious history of Matthew's grandfather (details still foggy) who'd won the land in a poker game, the only time he ever won. I loved Mark's quip then how 'it'd be cheaper to buy the place' (meaning he'd wasted much money on poker games). There were more stories over the long afternoon, the men talking on the beach as the children streaked past, racing from one end to the other. About how there there had once been no hut, just the land and they'd slept in a boat shed, and how Matthew had been coming since he was four. Now his own four year old daughter took that spot. They camped at night in the garden, this new generation, the big, private garden with towering trees still uncut, that had seen all these stories unfold.

The tide reversed so far to reveal the muddy flat teeming with oddities. Armies of blue soldier crabs marching for food, strange sponges, hermit crabs shells, sea snails and large crabs encrusted with barnacles and vegetation, so heavy and yet a disguise. I poked one for the children, leaning down close and saying "haha, look at this plant, it looks like a crab - poke - ARGHHHH!!" for it moved like a crab upon that poke and its eight legs erected itself into an unmistakingly defensive crab pose.

A kayak was pulled from under the house complete with two sets of paddles and we were offered its use. Mark and I began to squabble, still on land, about which way to go. I said right, he said left, it was settled by Matthew, and we headed right but ten strokes later the current and wind made us go left. It was a new perspective for me, from such a tiny craft on the big river, that for once, was not so strange, but now a warm, close thing that I knew much better.

Stripped Studs down to their Bare Nuts

Nothing worse than having your nuts stripped, as we found out today. Hmmm, stranded in Drummoyne amidst a lot of non-existent pedestrian crossings, loud construction work for the new Rozelle bridge, and our second attempt at two new front tyres thwarted again.

The first time the K-Mart auto tyre chaps couldn't get them off, then on the next visit those stud's tight nuts were given a beating. It warranted many phone calls around town to find some replacements, which Moshe of VW King was always going to offer the best deal to fix. A drive out to Canterbury tomorrow for a whole new rim $30. Sigh, it's not easy looking after a 38 year old sometimes.

Much more fun was hanging with my 3 year old. We killed time at the 'Christmas Shop' who were primped and ready with every kind of glow in the dark decoration, we even checked out the Vespa showroom and got a free magazine with poster just for being their only customers. Even the rainbow Paddlepop at the petrol station could not make the tyre change go quicker. Bacon and egg sandwich at The Cove cafe, play at the park....I was running out of ideas here.

Wobbygone

Wobbygone day 1
Originally uploaded by marksp54

Relaxing on the Hawkesbury River, in a holiday house, amongst the vines. We have several Shangri Las to hideaway in, all of them in the country, all of them beautiful. This one has a wooden hot tub and a fantastic garlic crusher. Other places have kangeroo mobs or trailertrash bongsmokers next door. The main thing is they are all rented and all mine for the time we are there. Caravan, tent, deck or dive.....take the kids and the man and get some fresh air x

Visibility Poor

I learnt a lot this week, I am amazed by the power of the internet, the speed with which so many locals responded and recorded the Sydney Dust Storm, the truth that rang loud with so many different photographers coming up with the same 'red' that couldn't possibly be faked by touch ups. But mostly, for me, not only just following 'the call' to get in my car, badly dressed and GO (I ended up walking over the Sydney Harbour Bridge), but after seeing thousands of images from all sorts of photographers, both amateur and professional, the STAY came loud and clear at last, stay where you are too, and see the beauty in that, be here now, love your life, love the light in your life, it doesn't need the Opera House or the bridge, it just needs love. I thought later that night 'oh my god, I should have gone to the swamp', my favourite place in the last year. How I wish I could have photographed that. So I shall file this little piece of self-earned knowledge away for the next time.

Do you know what? I asked the universe for this. Remember the copper skies of around 2002 from bushfires. I was tiring of photography, as you do, and I just couldn't be bothered to take many photos, even though I could really appreciate the beauty of the red light from the haze, I never took advantage of it. The day before this dust storm I lamented that and told the skies I wouldn't miss that opportunity ever again. Instant rewards. This photo is out the front of my house in the first minute after my family woke up and realised what was happening, after the three year old alerted us loudly to the fact the sky was orange and creeping around the edges of the venetian blinds like an alien light source. They have never seen me leap so fast out of bed. Those rubbish bins are in order L-R yellow, blue, red and green. I thought it was a good measure of how crazy the light was that you could hardly distinguish their true colours. After this shot I grabbed my car keys and just started driving, initially heading to our local bridge which has a fine view of the city, but visibility was so poor you couldn't see more than 100-200m so I kept following the city traffic and had this 'call' to walk over the Harbour Bridge. By the time I made it there and a few stop offs on the way to snap, they intensity of the red light had faded, so this shot here was the most red, and captures my daughter's fear, she went inside after this and started putting lots and lots of clothes on, too many, leggings, winter jackets, as if to protect herself. It was like waking up in a disturbing dream.

Where Are They Now?

Letter says "Tess Peni is working as a photographer for Australian Associated Press and will be travelling with the Prime Minster today." - on the campaign bus to the western suburbs MacMansion territories September 5, 2004

'Children Overboard' John Howard on the 2004 re-election campaign trail, Sydney, Australia 5 Sept 2004 (c) TESS PENI / Australian Associated Press

One Can Dream

I'm having a Kombi fantasy right now.. it involves a lot of rust removal, and paint and phat tyres with shiny hubcaps, tinted windows.....mmmm.

I just watched 'The Secret' again.... so I'm thinking of how my Kombi might benefit if a spare 20 thou were spent on it.

Towtrucks and Tickets

Oh dear, a bad ending to a pretty lousy week. I got a parking ticket by a nasty piece of work in Hall St, Bondi. She was already writing the ticket as I was crossing the road to buy an envelope. I came back in 2 minutes to see it being stuffed under my (not very well working) window wiper. Then she turned on me like cobra who is used to being cornered on a daily basis. I gave her the look - I was two minutes gone (I calculate at $4.40 per hour parking meter time, I should have really put in 6.5 cents), then she did this, she said "you've left your child in the car" (the sun had gone down), "I've recorded it and taken a photo" (so I did too) and "it's illegal - you know it is" (do I?). I said "he just woke up, I was two minutes!" (I really was) and she said "I've got four kids" and gave me a cobra spit. Depressing, so what will happen to me, will I get my kids taken off me? Will I go to hell, jail or worse - court.

All this after feeling so chipper about breaking down yesterday with a snapped clutch cable in the middle of the shopping centre, stuck at the exit with a line of cars up my bumper. I was rescued by a sweet Norfolk Islander that rounded up a car fulla of Maori council fellas who pushed me out of the way, he then drove me and my kid and the shopping home and gave me a free pencil made out of Norfolk pine. He said "up there things are a bit different and if somebody is in trouble, people pitch in and help". Not like the old bitch in the queue saying "Do you mind moving it! I'm in a hurry!!". I really would like her and the Hall St Cobra to connect sometime.

Postscript....these things, if you are superstitious, got to happen in threes. The next day I was dropping off a couple of guinea pigs we had been minding for friends who were holidaying. Pipsqueak and Dizzy, pretty casual, hungry, furry girls...who had obviously never been in a VW before. Pipsqueak began to show the signs of irrational terror and leapt out of her travelling box in the front, she was petrified by the roaring sound of my ultra-mega engine (one can dream) and started to run about unleashed, heading straight for the shade under the brake pedal. I did a 'drop off' manoeuvre, the sort of "I'm just pulling slowly to the side with all indicators blazing because I have a small animal under my brake pedal and can't use it right now or two little kids will come home from Thailand to find their pet squashed" sort of road tactic. Needless to say the pigs were happy when they got home.

Wake Me Up Before You GoGo

I heard the possum get caught in the trap this morning, at dawn. At first I felt pity, hearing it shouting in possum 'WTF?!&*%$##', then a faint schadenfreude set in as I packed up my earplugs, hopefully forever, never to be woken again by scratchy native feet coming and going in the night through a portal that is positioned exactly above my insomniac head.

It's up there now, in a cage, probably sleeping, waiting for its release, which thankfully the Possum Man will give as required by law, somewhere within a two hundred metre radius. It might find a comfy tree to crawl into, or someone else's roof peeling at the edges. I dread it may even try to break back into the patched-up roof above it used to, until this night, call home.

I know how it feels, being moved on. Renters, we who act like we own the place and taint the joint with our bothersome animality.

I wish I could take a little hot joe up there into the roof and stroke the sad thing, explain how it has to leave because I can't bear to lay awake every night in fear it will wake me up. How I've had to strain to find any wandering earplugs that've fallen to the farthest corner under my bed, embedded in dust. I'm tired of looking up from my pillow at the stains from excrement piled up and seeping through. I'm tired of being moved on too, from developers, rent hikers, divorcing owners who want to sell. I want this small corner of our new house, this pretty lady-cave I've claimed, all to myself.

Eyesight Salad

At 37 my eyesight is starting to have bad days - usually fatigued depending on the Facebooking action from the night before. Being a photographer, I need pinhole sharp peepers.  I can always flick the digi camera dial to autofocus - if I can find the damn thing - anything under 15cm is a bit fuzzy now and makes my head hurt.

Focus used to be possible at a lovely visually acute 10cm, apparently the distance between a mother's loving gaze into her newborn's whilst breastfeeding in a glowing reverie. Well those days are way over. Now it's more likely I can just register an incoming headbutt at 10 o'clock at a k.p.h. hard to judge whilst I wait for my vision to pull focus. 

The $20 cheapie glasses at the newsagency give me superhero vision until I take them off and start dry retching from the naseau they induce into the mints and jellybean section, and before I march into the optometrist and pay $800 for a Calvin Klein look I have been thinking about what I can do to improve my eyes au natural.

I have invented the 'Eyesight Salad' - full of food that will give you bouncy, stretchy, muscular (eye)balls and keep macular degeneration still waiting in the nightclub queue.

EYESIGHT SALAD (for 2)

2 handfuls of washed baby spinach

125g small tin of Red Salmon (check label, get Wild Red Sockeye - Coles have a good brand)

1 advocado sliced

1/2 pear sliced

1/2 small red onion finely sliced

sprinkle of pine nuts or any chopped nuts

toss ingredients together and use a dressing of your choice, eg. Balsamic vinegar with Olive oil and garlic

Devour  blindly

Random Acts of Weirdness

This entry is just a really bad effort to get back to blogging, I've been distracted lately by FlickR, Facebook and my new webpage, y'know how it goes, but all this time I've been busy I've still been driving around town in my beloved VW and enjoying being tall on the road (as opposed to short in life).

Except when I walked to the pizza shop, I spotted this really cool car that I'm thinking when the VW finally goes to Kombie heaven, I want one like it, it'll be my early mid-life crises car, definately something like a Charger, with a tiny back seat that has no room for baby seats.

Other than the usual photographing of spiders and children I had a 'Steve Irwin sighting'....is he really dead. Or is he adventure sporting with Elvis. Till I find the definative answer, all I have is this fuzzy shot taken recently.

Finally, you never know when you number is up so I have a luckly $8 to give away via Kombie Kash which should bring a tear to any VW (pre-1972) lover's eye.  Come to think of it, I have been watching a lot of 'My Name is Earl' DVD box set, perhaps there is a link between all these random acts of weirdness.

Psychedelic History of the VW

Think one of those pesky kids took this, very creative little chicks.

Ode to Motherhood

I love being a mum

I love being a photographer

I love having a fat bum

But I should listen to Ajay Rochester

I love my sunburnt country

I love my sunburnt bum

I hope Obama wins

I pray for new manchester

Find Yourself a Nice Bird

A sound rings from the swamp, a clear clang bird call, slowly emerging from the tweet-clutter.

A boy bird searching for a spring love. Even my human-girl ears are piqued to this heart cry ringing true. All noise litter stops to hear the deep evolutionary song trickle through the air and thick vegetation,  a rythmic ponk ponk sent out with the pure mission to enrapture a mate, to seek for that one set of ears that cannot resist.

Then a hammer starts to bang, a plane flies above, all the creatures titter at once again. Rowdy rainbow lorikeets squawk like a football crowd, cheap chirps fling about in casual conversation about the weather, gossip, where to eat, where to go. The lover's throat is quiet.

Eucalyptus leaves rustle in a high breeze to shoosh the rabble. In the vacuum after a plane trail a space grows.  All the chat starts up again only to give way to the soloist who emerges above the din to pierce a  lovebird heart that beats in the swamp.

Cockatoo Island

I was photographing some bullshit stiletto race in the Quay which stank of money and corporate sponsorship, not to mention downright demeaning to women, so I made a gettaway via ferry which dropped by Cockatoo Island, a little re-discovered abandoned patch on the Parramatta River. They used to build big ships there back in the days of black and white. The baby had finally fallen asleep on my chest from the swell of the ferry casting him about, I took my chance, took my leave and pushed the stroller ashore. I need some yin to the yang of 245 women running in high heels.

I found myself sucked into a 200m long sandstone tunnel to get some shade. It was eerie, speakers played creepy music as you walked under the wooden pillars that supported the low roof of 'Dog Leg Tunnel', cause it had a big bend in the middle I guessed. Finally we popped out the end into that Spring sun that's taking some getting used to, and found myself wondering what to do next.

This was a Biennale of Sydney location showcasing artworks from around the globe, but the backdrop stole the show. It was like the abandoned mine in 'Thomas the Tank Engine'. It was the perfect place for Scooby Doo Mystery Mayhem, it reeked of an olde worlde forgotten time. Huge factory shells dripping with industrial leftovers. Mega machines lay dusty and rusty.

I'm always amazed by the big scale of men

and their ways, how they build things, shift enormous chunks of machinery around the globe, whether it be a ship or a bridge or a building, they seem unafraid of scale. Why, women get to give birth, that's pretty amazing too.

The more I walk around this decrepit island, the mood starts to infiltrate me, the privacy and dusty corners are filled with floating particles of light that dance and take me to a lost quiet. The stiletto race washes away and I'm thinking about form and light for a change, not celebrity and exclusives, nor cheesy Opera House backdrops and whether some girl is sexy enough to sell a shot.

Why do people do anything?

Why do I toil at all, when I anything I look back on that once gave me pride, I don't feel any connection to it like I do at the moment of execution of creation, it's the doing that counts, not the memory. I get riled looking at old family photos because they are essentially useless, they only stir up muddy emotions, blow a wistful air in my ear, brag of a time that has passed. Why do I even take photos at all?

Mmmmmm, I start to think, this would make a terrific location for a shoot.....shove a pretty woman in front of this stuff and print the cash. Then suddenly there are other photographers next to me, with more expensive large format cameras, like a reoccuring nightmare, they've even bought their cute girlfriend. I breath and force myself to focus on focal points.

And tonal ranges, shadows, blacks, colour temperatures.....

I see a sign that says 'no photography', oops. I presume they mean of the artworks, which I've neglected to actually notice most of, so I try a little harder. It makes me think about the artists, and their current mood, or maybe their mood next week when the Biennale is over and it's all just a dream. All this hard work, just a dream. I think, did he have fun making that sculpture of a crocodile out of what are they.... rooftop capsules????

Somebody made this, they took lots of time to specially write out all the different measurements, to file something that made something, that made something.....and so on it goes, like ants in the nest, we are but put on this earth to roll little balls of dirt about because that is what we do. The rain can wash it away at any time, but it's that drive to do that we follow till the heart stops.

Why does the light of an open doorway appeal to me, why is it my job to notice it? I start to think that I'm ready for my old career back, the last baby is a boy now, but this boy starts to stir in his stroller and upon wakening fully throws himself onto the concrete and wham, I'm back in the day job, fully. But whilst he dreamt that 45 minutes away, so did I. 

Don't Mess with the Don

I'm having 'blog wishes' come true. After my previous whinging about having no mobile phone I now possess a sexy white iphone with $500 per month credit...and after moaning about having no career, I did two freelance jobs this week. As it's never come up before I may as well mention I am what is formerly known as a paparazzi, but now that word is too loaded with lawsuits and manslaughter charges, I just prefer photographer.

Today it was actress Eva Mendes, a Cuban hottie who flew all the way around the world to squeeze her little brown self into my camera lens. I am a sucker for a pretty lady and a gift bag. After two kids and low income I now cram as many freebies in with my camera gear whereas in my previous life B.C. (before children) I must have had so much disposable income I just sneered at the promotional perfume or italian water being past around.

So I turn up early to get a good spot, and lo - there's one right in the middle waiting just for little old me! I am technically the shortest photographer in Sydney so I go well in the middle of a media scrum, it's great to double park behind me and shoot over my head, as long as you don't try and use me to balance on like a tripod, I won't accidently step on your foot.

So this bloke I've never seen (fair to say I've been on/off 5 years maternity leave mate) pipes up and says,

"that's Don's spot"

I'm like who-the-fuck-is-Don? "Well where's Don now?"

"He's gone out for a sec but when he comes back he's not going to be real happy"

I'm thinking who IS this Don that's got fatboy really scared.

I said "well he's not here now so it doesn't matter, he'll find another spot"

and fatboy is shaking his head at me like I've just sworn against the mafia. I know I've been a casual drop in since I left the scene to have babies, but this guy doesn't realise that time and space has only made me stronger, why all that time at home I have been wrestling for tiny increments of my own personal elbow room, Lord I finally got the cot out of the bedroom last week and have a child-free nighttime for the first time since the original conception.

"What are you, his bodyguard?" I said "Don knows the rules mate, yer leave a bag or something" I reminded him of statute 21 of celebrity photographer's code. "Possession is ninth-tenths of the law".

He hissed through his teeth like now I'm really gonna get it. "Don't blame me when he get's back and he wants his spot back"

"Don't worry I'll sort Don out" I said, thinking Don is nothing compared to a tantruming two year old.

"Oh there's Don over there" he says, relieved and his shoulders unscrunch.

"Oh what, Don's got two spots going?" I say and overlook fatboy to say hello my oldest colleague behind him - the only one with manners and kids.

I leave early because the fatboy on my right and the photographer on my left started the squeeze on me, but I already got the shot they missed, I decided to get home early and wire it out first. Now I'm sitting here smelling like a tart's armpit and wondering what else I can ask the blog fairy for......

Mummy, where is my career?

What do you tell yourself after you've pushed the boat of your career out and realised you forgot to tie a line? Turn and look at what is holding you to the shore? Turn your back on the sea and delude yourself "it's not so great, I've seen it before." At what stage do I just dive in fully dressed and start to swim like mad to get that little boat back or is it gone forever, nobody told me not to let go, to shelter it somewhere. Isn't that what you should tell your daughters before they have children, before they sink the little part of their heart that is so hard to resuscitate after letting it go? What have I done!

Pessimism is a last resort

Very busy dreams last night.  Melinda (she's a fitness instructor) is baking pies. I'm not allowed to touch them. Eunice is at Coles, she walks past me, I'm near a register waiting to be served. I must also find time to enter the Moran Art Prize. The dream shows me ten artworks so beautiful, a whole body of work - pointillist, silvery, esoteric - great stuff. Tiny windows of magic light flashed at me for a second. I suppose my imagination was exhibiting what I am capable of. I drink them down fast like shots.

I wake up to fart and think on this coldest morning of the year. 'Six degrees' reported from MSP who delivers the morning cup of 'hot, steaming Joe', which it is not by the time I pull-up on one elbow. My fingers peep out from under the doona, feeling bitten, looking for pen and paper. My arse does an excellent impression of a trombone. I consider risking frostbite up to the elbow to reach the coffee before it is beyond repair.

This was to be the weekend I meant to rent a six hundred dollar snow chalet overlooking Lake Eucumbeen. Poverty, once again, has forced me to live behind my hopes. Our next fabulous weekend planned in the country of my day-dreams is Dubbo Western Plains Zoo. I shall wake up in August and think 'I dreamt of lion's roaring last night - in Gladesville'. 

It hurts. I like to concentrate on pain in the morning. By afternoon I've worked my way up to mild discontent. If I plan an outing I can enjoy slight boredom. In the evenings I turn to drink. I've decided that making money might get me truly wondrous. That way I can use it to gawp at expensive magazines, spread my legs at top-class beauty salons and ideally visit African animal resorts and centrally-heated winter cabins. I would alleviate my ennui with trips to IKEA and post large packages of gifts to my nieces instead of the piddling efforts I'm currently guilty of.

For this week's menu, in order to buy myself a book or a bra, I'll plan meals that rely heavily on noodles and vegetables. That old temptation to toilet train Chuckles returns every time I enter isle three for nappies. By the time I pay for my trolleyload I'll experience the equivalent of a tiny thrill, smug in the knowledge I can feed the family for another week, or is it just seeing a three figure number on a cash register. In my Coles dream I spot Eunice shopping, I bet she never has to count carefully for groceries. In real life I did phone her for a loan so I could rent the snow chalet. She never acknowledged the request, she did however tell me of her own plans to take her children skiing. I pray to be a considerate friend, so blog bitching about them isn't very good as they are my only readers. Names have been changed.

There is a particular time of morning, when I am due to get up, the sun enters the window, piercing my dim, sleepy world. I am not a morning person because I wake up angry, covered in sleep-mud. Writing helps me beat off depressing, rabid-dog thoughts. I have to mentally kick the little fuckers off me. Sometimes that small, happy square of sunlight drifts over me and picks me up from under my armpits and props me up on the pillows and says 'here, drink this'.

The clouds mask the sun with a grey filter, everything is not so sunny, there is no pick me up. My pen is grumpy, the coffee has gone cold. But today I remember the science, that if I lay here as usual, I know that somewhere the sun is swimming in its blue sky as usual, just behind the clouds, right there where it always is, only obscured by a passing earth mood. It will come back. I cheer myself with thoughts like 'when I am dead I will get to sleep in a bit longer'. My Auntie Christine (pictured in the 60's) died in her mid-thirties of a brain tumour, cleaning the kitchen cupboards.