unfortunate one

'Copper' by Adam Cullen (source)

I recently finished reading a book by Erik Jensen called "Acute Misfortune: the life and death of Adam Cullen". Before coming to this book, I didn't know anything about Adam Cullen.  Still, the story of this tortured artist, and the writing of Erik Jensen compelled me to finish the book in record time.

While I was reading the book, I would find myself overcome with an intense lack of hope, void of any positive thought at all.  It was only after a couple of successive nights reading, that I figured out it was the books contents which had me at these terrible lows. I'm not sure a book has ever had such an influence on me, that I could be coerced into such a mindset without realising it.

Adam Cullen was this completely unlikeable, manic and abrasive human being who seemed to seek out the things and feelings in life that send most people reeling.  He seemed to be driven by some childish narcissistic view of the world, pushing his friends, family and even the author to breaking point. It seemed that he did whatever he felt, when he felt that way.  He was un-apologetically himself - whatever he chose to be that moment.

Looking at his art, you can see these things about him.  Things are painted seemingly with raw abandon - messy strokes and drips and a crudeness I'm not artsy-clever enough to describe.

I'm not sure I learnt much about what made Adam Cullen tick, but I appreciated the insight into his world and mind, and I think highly of the author, Erik Jensen, who painted his own picture of Adam Cullen with disarming honesty and authenticity.

What the Dickens?

On my bedside table, Charles Dickens and E.L James are at war. I confess, I was the one who started it all....

Way back in March, I began reading "Great Expectations." And Charles Dickens has been kicking my arse with his curly language and character sketches ever since. I figured that given it's such a famous book, by such a celebrated writer, that I owed it to myself to give it a go.

As for the 'acclaimed' E.L James, it hurts me to admit that blinded by amazon.com reviews, I too succumbed to the societal peer pressure and started reading "50 Shades of Grey" about a month ago, to see what the fuss was all about. Oh, how I rue the day I began cheating on Dickens with this cheap floozy. Two words: over-rated.

It's my own fault really. It was an ordinary night, Dickens had been giving me such a hard time - I just wanted an easy catch. Grey was sitting there on my lonely kindle, a place I reserve for books I know I won't care to hold, and it just kind of happened. I have only disappointed myself...

Oh Charles, if he only knew, he'd likely be rolling in his grave. Just fancy a face off between Miss Havisham and Anastasia Steele, urrgh the name, bloody hell, I just want to vomit - Miss Havisham would likely throw her mouldy wedding cake at Steele's head as she rocked herself in the corner of the room, huddled in the foetal position. It's no contest, they should scarcely share the same bookish air. Most disturbing of all, Dickens pulls in annual earnings in the way of $3 million, while James is believed to make $1 million dollars every week on her shades of shit. It's outrageous - somebody should have that woman stopped immediately.

And what does it say about our society when we are actually interested in this rubbish? People are starting to talk freely about reading in passing conversation and "50 Shades of Grey" is the vehicle - oh the tragedy. I can feel my intelligence waning, even as I write this post. Dickens is fine cuisine and James is like wordy junk food - all "down there" and lip biting, wah, wah - use your words James, or just some other words!?

I'm 20 pages from the "Great Expectations" finish line, Pip Pirrip you observant little bastard, I can't wait see how this ends for you buddy.

I suppose, like the old adage nothing worth having comes easy, so too it is for books and language. While Dickens lives on 150 odd years after putting pen to paper, E.L. James will surely disappear into second hand bookstores and 20cent garage sale piles. I hope.

how to be a woman

If ever faced with a situation, in which I needed to refer to myself as a 'woman', I would always mentally stutter on the word - as if it were an untruth. Of course, physically I fit into that category just fine, but emotionally.. mentally - I've never really been sure.  I don't know if it's because I feel 'woman' is a descriptor saved for strong, self assured females; mothers or mature types that have grown into themselves? As for me, I don't feel strong or sure about anything - mostly I'm just trying to keep myself relatively sane and alive on a day to day basis.

So, when I heard about the book by Caitlin Moran, entitled "How to be a Woman" - the category of which it belongs is 'Humour/Feminism' I was intrigued.

where it's at

'Feminism' is another one of those uncomfortable terms for me.  I suppose that's because in my head I thought that feminists are the kind of folk to burn their bras in giant bonfires, yell at men, be generally dissatisfied and kind of argumentative. The sort of women who might cause me to blush with a controversial comment, and challenge me to think - have my own opinions and be bold with them. However, this is all beside the point, because this book is not really like that at all!

In her book, Moran isn't trying to turn us into bitter and twisted man haters - instead it is a humorous look at things from her point of view - littered with truths, life experiences, and the stuff of things to make you think - to make me think.

At its beginning, Moran talks about the logistics of being a woman - she states "..in many ways, there is no crueler or more inappropriate present to give a child than oestrogen and a big pair of tits". Well, she's preaching to the choir here with that one - it was the long hot summer of 1994 that saw me eternally condemned to sports-days in my baggy school jumper. God, that was shitty, and inevitably futile - just as Moran observes "the problem with battling yourself is that even if you win, you lose.  At some point - scarred, and exhausted - you either accept that you must become a woman - that you are a woman - or you die.." (of heat exhaustion perhaps?)

It interests me when she likens the fight of feminism to an analogy of broken windows.  "In the 'Broken Windows' theory, if a single broken window on an empty building is ignored, and not repaired, the tendency is for vandals to break a few more windows.  Eventually, they may break into the building, and light fires, or become squatters." In her mind, perhaps if we don't sweat the small feminist stuff - which in this case, are the broken windows, then women won't have a chance with the big stuff because our whole house is going to be burnt down by squatters! (I promise she explains it far better than I do!)

Later, Moran addresses the question on all our lips: am I a feminist? To which she provides a brief but effective assessment: "Put your hands in your pants. a) Do you have a vagina? and b) Do you want to be in charge of it? If you said 'yes' to both, then congratulations! You're a feminist." Simple really. Yes, and hell yes - for the record. She convinces me further with: "what do you think feminism IS, ladies? What part of 'liberation for women' is not for you? Is it freedom to vote? The right not to be owned by the man you marry? The campaign for equal pay? 'Vogue', by Madonna? Jeans? Did all that good shit GET ON YOUR NERVES?" And then, to cement it all, she later affirms "...it's not as if strident feminists want to take over from men. We're not arguing for the whole world. Just our share."

Other note able quotes that had me giggling in delight, or thinking... or both:

"When did feminism become confused with Buddhism? Why on earth have I, because I'm a woman, got to be nice to everyone?...I don't build in a 20 per cent 'Genital Similarity Regard-Bonus' if I meet someone else wearing a bra.  If someones an arsehole, someones an arsehole - regardless of whether we're both standing in the longer toilet queue..."

"What is feminism? Simply the belief that women should be as free as men, however nuts, dim, deluded, badly dressed, fat, receding, lazy and smug they might be.  Are you a feminist?  Hahaha. Of course you are."

"Because at the moment, I can't help but notice that in a society obsessed with fat - so eager in the appellation, so vocal in its disapproval - the only people who aren't talking about it are the only people whose business it really is."

"Based on my own personal experiences, 100,000 years of male superiority has its origins in the simple basis that men don't get cystitis."

"When we discuss the great tragedies that can possible befall a woman, once we have discounted war and injury, it is the idea of being unloved, and therefore unwanted that we wince over the most. Elizabeth I may have laid the groundworks of the British Empire, but she could never marry - poor, pale, mercury-caked queen." Now this, I relate to, because I am one of those silly women who thinks this way.

On shoes: "Women wear heels because they think they make their legs look thinner..they think that by effectively walking on tip-toes, they're slimming their legs down from  size 14 to a size 10.  But they aren't, of course. There is a precedent for a big fat leg dwindling away to a point - and it's on a pig."

"If I'm going to spend £500 on a pair of designer shoes, it's going to be a pair that I can a) dance to 'Bad Romance' in, and b) will allow me to run away from a murderer, should one suddenly decide to give chase."

On kids: "To be frank, childbirth gives a woman a gigantic set of balls. The high you get as you realise it's all over, and that you didn't actually die, can last the rest of your life. Off their faces with euphoria...new mothers finally tell the in-laws to back off, dye their hair red, get driving lessons, go self-employed, learn to use a drill, experiment with Thai condiments, make cheerful jokes about incontinence, and stop being scared of the dark."

"Every parent has their particular moment where they realised that, since they'd had a child, nothing really fazed them anymore. For me, it was the day that potty-training Lizzie went wrong, and I had to kick a poo, across a falconry display, in a marquee, at Regent's Park Zoo."

"Feminism needs zero tolerance over baby angst. In the 21st century, it can't be about who we might make, and what they might do, any more. It has to be about who we are, and what we're going to do." Well said Caitlin Moran!

On the ugly machine that is gossip magazines: "I've read more about Oprah Winfrey's arse than I have about the rise of China as an economic superpower. I fear this is no exaggeration. Perhaps China is rising as an economic superpower because its women aren't spending all their time reading about Oprah Winfrey's arse."

On how to know: "...in the same way you can tell if some sexism is happening to you by asking the question 'Is this polite, or not?', you can tell whether some misogynistic societal pressure is being exerted on women by calmly enquiring, 'And are the men doing this, as well?'"

On ageing and plastic surgery: "I want a face full of frown lines and weariness and cream-coloured teeth that, frankly, tells stupid and venal people to FUCK OFF... Lines and greyness are nature's way of telling you not to fuck with someone - the equivalent of the yellow and black banding on a wasp..." I really like her theory.

On the reality of not being a princess: "Accepting you're just some perfectly ordinary woman who is going to have to crack on, work hard and be polite in order to get anything done is - once you've got over the crippling disappointment of your thundering ordinariness - incredibly liberating."

"Simply being honest about who we really are is half the battle...there's so much stuff -in every respect - that we can't afford and yet we sighingly resign ourselves to, in order to join in, and feel 'normal'. But, of course, if everyone is, somehow, too anxious to say what their real situation is, then there is a new, communal, median experience which is being kept secret by everyone being too embarrassed to say, 'Don't think I'm a freak, but..."

Upon finishing this clever read - I'm not entirely sure that I'm ready to accept I will never be a princess; I'm not even sure what kind of woman I'm trying to be, but like Caitlin Moran: "what I really want to be, all told, is a human. Just a productive, honest, courteously treated human. One of 'The Guys'. But with really amazing hair." Yep, that about covers it.

SB

as they say

no matter how bad things can become,
how they might go off the rails, you
just have to remind yourself that
worse things happen at sea...

I have just finished reading "Worse Things Happen at Sea" by William McInnes and Sarah Watt. It was a beautiful book - about the simple things in life... and some of the complicated things too. 

I don't know what it is that attracts me to autobiographies and memoirs - I think it's something to do with seeing how other people deal with the difficulties in their lives; usually it is those who attack their problems with humor, grace and a touch of fight, that I really enjoy and applaud. Perhaps this is because I hope to approach my 'rainy days' with similar tact.  I like reading about their experiences, because even when these people are obviously so far removed from my reality - the common threads of human experience are still identifiable within their stories.

In reading this story of love, family and heartache - at times, it was hard to imagine any truth in the title. Could worse things really happen? I was heartbroken when Sarah wrote about the baby they lost during childbirth; and again as William spoke of scattering the babys ashes in the sea. The passing of their pet dog, and Sarah's illness were also emotional. Filled to the brim with memories and truth, the stories of these two remarkable writers were challenging - as they examined the blessings and discomforts in their lives, so too, did I.

I think what made reading this book a finer, but more difficult experience, was knowing that since the book was finished, Sarah had lost her fight with cancer.  The greatest tragedy to me, seems to be that these two people are no longer together. But I do believe Sarah Watt made quite a dent in her life. I think, after all, her 'dam' overflowed with all the good things - love, inspiration, laughter and some tears.

"I began to count what I had. Not my blessings, just what I had: a car, a healthy child, a lovely man, enough money to pay the mortgage, not enough to cause worry, Australian citizenship, ten pairs of shoes.  A pathetic amount in some eyes, absurdly wasteful in others.... I had taught myself to do this.  I was trying to make myself a positive person.  I wanted the glass half-full, no matter how much unfairness in the world, how many starving people, global catastrophes or prophecies of doom.. I wanted to hear the voice of promise and hope and optimism. I wanted to not just know that birth and death are inevitable, but to believe it, to allow for it, to be at peace with it..." (Sarah)

"What can I say? Life is a smorgasbord, so many dishes to choose from and sometimes you just choose the wrong one, but you know nothings ever wasted.." (William)

"Life is indeed a smorgasbord with so much to offer.  We'll all have our time in the sun.  Fashions fade and so does a life, but friendship, between old friends and new, is a tacit agreement between us that we don't have to fade alone.." (William)

"How do you measure a 'fair share' of time? By quantity or quality? Mine has been of excellent quality.  I've had a great time.  I didn't spend twenty-five years in a job I hate, resenting it but needing it.  I've never been confined to a wheelchair.  I'm not deaf or blind...I'm not a tragedy.  I can't complain.  I've had it good.  The best thing I can do is balance the good luck with the bad and go with good grace or, in the current parlance of my children, suck it up and get on with what I have to do with what I've got.  And I have a lot...Like my dad's job and personality I seem to have been a dam builder.  I am full of all that I have collected, done, loved and regretted.  It is a large dam." (Sarah)

"Why do we search for and expect happiness all the time, like some dumb weekend magazine article? Or even contentment.  Sometimes rage is good.  There are things to be enraged about in this world.  There are tears that should fall." (Sarah)

SB

parlez vous strangebird?!

It has been a well measured exercise in persistence - requiring the devotion of both time and consciousness. "A Fraction of the Whole" by Steve Toltz is a mystery to me, no-more!

I finished page number 561 a few hours ago, but there's so much more to follow.  My book looks like a homage to the sticky flag. Ordinarily, I don't do this to my books...well, save for years 11 and 12 English Lit class, where quote marking was a necessary evil. But while reading this book, I just felt I had to mark every occasion that saw me wide-eyed, open mouthed - re-read a sentence or paragraph that had made an impression on me.  There were a lot of these occasions.

I cannot appropriately describe my feelings about this book - as I lack both the adequate vocabulary and experience to do so; but I can say that I found this read, one of the most enjoyable of my adult life. So many times, when I read a book, particularly a notoriously good one - I feel like I'm on the outside; one step behind the joke; isolated by clever words and unrelatable story. However, this was different. For want of a better way to articulate it - it seemed like the writer, Steve Toltz was speaking my language.

No arrogance intended.

* * * * *

Because out there in the real world, freedom means you have to admit authorship, even when your story turns out to be a stinker.

He held the photograph under my eyes. I don't know if faces can be the polar opposite of each other...this one grinned as if he'd been photographed on the happiest day of not just his life but all life everywhere.

The past is truly an inoperable tumor that spreads to the present.

I saw all the dawns come up too early and all the middays reminding you you'd better get a hurry on and all the dusks whisper "I don't think you're going to make it" and all the shrugging midnights say "Better luck tomorrow."  I saw all the hands that ever waved to a stranger thinking it was a friend.  I saw all the eyes that ever winked to let someone know their insult was only a joke.."

The game is an analogy for life: there are not enough chairs or good times to go around, not enough food, not enough joy, nor beds nor jobs nor laughs nor friends nor smiles nor money nor clean air to breathe.. and yet the music goes on.

I realised that her sweetness, the way she carried on with the people of the town, was her mask.  It was a good one, the best kind of mask there is: a true lie.  Her mask was a weave of tattered shreds torn from all the beautiful parts of herself.

The faces of a city take on a supremely cruel and indifferent quality when you wander through it in the midst of a personal crisis.  It's depressing that nobody stops to hold your hand.

These dumb, bored, unempathetic people are all around us.  We can't trust anyone to behave himself. We always have to be on the lookout.  Here's the case-winning example: it doesn't happen every day, but every now and then, people shit in public swimming pools.  That just says it all to me.

There's something disturbing about a thirty-two-year-old man putting his thirty-two-year-old soul into the mouth of a child...

Eddie, Dad's best friend, was a thin Thai man with a sleazy mustache who always seemed to be smack bang in the middle of the prime of life and not a day over.

The meaning of faith is our understanding w/ Creator that he will not eavesdrop on our mind's whisper to itself unless invited.

I think her love for me has nothing to do with me except proximity - wrong place, wrong time.

I ran & suddenly I was not alone: along came the shame of a man who all at once discovers he's been ungrateful so we ran thew three of us - me & shame & ingratitude running together like three shadows of three men who were running just ahead.

I'll teach you how to yell with your mouth closed & how to steal happiness & how the only real joy is singing yourself hoarse...& how not to leave the windows of your heart open when it looks like rain & how everyone has a stump where something necessary was amputated...

I couldn't see it but I knew the sun was around there somewhere - its yawn had lit the air.

..and I thought about how when the apocalypse comes there's bound to be someone with big hair standing in front of me...

That's the problem with people who suffer right in your face.  They can't so much as scratch their noses without its being poignant.

The moment stretched its way into infinity, then snapped back to about a nanosecond and rebounded, so all in all it lasted about eight and a half seconds.

There's little doubt that when the defining moments arise in which charatcer is molded, you'd better make the right decision.  The mold dries and sets quickly.

I saw him as a spider who woke up thinking he was a fly and didn't understand he was caught on his own web.

That's the great thing about blame: she goes where you send her, no questions asked.

It was as if a thread in my brain had become loose, but I was afraid to pull on it in case my whole being unraveled.

I remembered how Orwell described the future as a boot stamping on a human face forever, and I thought that all around me were boots, people so terrible that the whole human race should be punished for doing nothing to curb their existence.

See your doctor if loneliness persists.

SB xx

the art of remembering

Reading an article in the most excellent frankie magazine on the intricacies of nostalgia, got me thinking about the kinds of things that transport me to the past.  The article, entitled 'rose-tinted' states:

"a recent Chinese study links nostalgia with a psychological state called "resilience" which is basically our ability to cope with life's little knocks. It found that people with resilience use nostalgia as a coping strategy."

How interesting.

When I was a little girl, I was given a lovely lockable diary. Recollecting the exact details is difficult - its puffy white cover with a pretty water colour illustration and elements of gilded gold - a little girl, perhaps a straw hat and puppy dog too.  It was filled with lined pages of various pastel shades, and the pages emitted a gorgeous girlie scent.  I cannot begin to describe the exact smell, but whenever I encounter it, I am immediately reminded of my special diary - and the smell of secrets. The safety contained in the writing on these pages was eventually lost to paranoid teenage years - but the smell always takes me back to a time when things were simpler.



SB xx

woman of letters: to the man who (will) change(d) my life

One of my favourite letters in the "Women of Letters" book is from Eddie Perfect, who writes a letter to the woman who changed his life - his partner. Some of the quotes that I just can't forget:

"I may have a melancholy, sentimental streak wider than the widest bits of the Murray, but I find writing love songs the hardest. There's no sting and no hurt. There's no river of tears to dip the bucket into. Love songs go in by the front door, and I've always scrambled in through the laundry window.."

"I don't know what a family is, how to define it, other than as a collection of people who bind themselves together and get weirder and weirder... I read there's evidence that the moon was created when a giant asteroid shaved a chunk off the earth. That's a family. A broken bit of rock that gets its own name and develops its own gravitational pull."

"you have to kick the can down the street - always kicking it forward no matter the can and no matter the street, just keep kicking it on down. Deadshits don't kick the can anywhere and stomp on your can and never push anything forward."

I'm not sure I've encountered the man who has changed my life, so, instead, I write the imaginary man who hopefully will.

To the man who will change my life,
First of all, where the fuck are you and why have you kept me waiting for so long? (Sorry, that was a little forward, wasn't it? I suppose you're going to have to get used to that.)

I'm not sure who you are, or how we'll meet - but I think I have a pretty good idea about the kind of man you are. For one, you'll be special - you would have to be to make a dent in my existence; plus, you'd have to be a certain kind of 'special' to put up with my irregular brand of shit. (Wow, I'm really selling myself here, aren't I?)

I think you'll be the quiet man in the corner - the one surveying the lay of the land. A people watcher, like me. Perhaps I'll catch your eye, on one occasion, because I'm not like the rest of the girls in the room - perhaps I'll hold your eye for the same reason.

My quirks will make you like me even more.  You will recognise that I am hard work (sorry, I am) - but you will be persistent, because you are the kind of man who understands that tenacity is rewarded.

You will lighten my heart like I have never known; you will believe in me; always, but especially during the times I don't recognise myself. Oh yes, you will be special indeed.

And for all your special-ness, I will confuse you, and challenge you - and maybe make you want to run away... but you never will.

You will make me laugh; you'll be the yin to my yang - the up to my down.

And, for all of this, I will give you my heart - because that is all I want to do. All I have ever wanted to do was find you - perfect you - and give you my time, my laughter, my love notes. I know you'll be perfect, because you'll be for me.

I really wish you'd hurry your ass up - you'll come to know that I am impatient. Find me soon, ok?

SB xx

woman of letters: to my twelve year old self

In homage to the brilliant movement that is Women of Letters and because I am thoroughly enjoying the newly released book, I decided that I too, would pen some letters of my own...


Hiya Little Bird,
If I know you, you're probably flipping out about this whole 'letter from the future' thing - but I'm going to need you to calm down, ok? You are not going make the world fold onto itself and disappear into a black hole by reading on. Trust me. Trust yourself - always, but especially now.

So, you're 12.  I know right now things are ticking along better than ever. You're head girl (YAY us!) at school, you scored the most awesome year seven teacher in Mr Jones - he's preparing you well for high school, so take it all in, and things are just generally pretty cool.  Anyone who's anyone is wearing a bra now, so there's no need to be all self conscious anymore.  Actually, you should know - that right now you are at your confidence prime. You-me - we will never feel so good about ourselves again - so hang onto that feeling, and preserve it for as long as you can - when you lose it, it really hurts.

I'm not going to tell you everything - but I do want to give you some tips that I think might help us both out... and perhaps save us from two years of counselling with our lovely, well meaning Psychologist Judy.

I know you are starting to freak out about high school.  I need to tell you, that it's actually going to be ok.  You shouldn't worry - that's a bad habit of ours Little Bird, and you need to cut it out - it gets us nowhere. Anyway, high school - in all the ways you think matter - will be fine.  You will have friends around you, you will not be given a 'royal flush' like cousin Jason says you will; as for the work - you handle it just fine. We're book smart, remember.

There is one little teeny thing that happens, that makes life hell for, well, I'm not going to lie - a long while. So, if you can try to avoid this little something - it would be most advantageous (look it up in the dictionary) for us both. 

Next year, one of the bullshit classes we have to endure is 'Outdoor Ed' - the 'teacher' is one of those horrid P.E. teachers (you know how we feel about them). Anyway, during the course of one of the classes, you will be out walking with the group, down by the dam near home - and you will be told to cross the dam by balancing on a pole that runs across the edge. DON'T DO IT Little Bird; fake an asthma attack - run off, whatever you have to do - just don't do it!  When I did it, I fell in - and then we spent the next year or so, dodging vicious taunting from that ADD asshole kid Lucas, and his followers. I suspect this one incident changes the course of our high school experience, and it gives us a real battering; so if you can avoid it - I think we'll turn out less damaged. Of course, every P.E. teacher is an asshole - so you'll always have to watch out for them.

Also - try not to attend school on Valentines Day in year eight.  Matty D gets an anonymous card that one shithead, mediocre handwriting analyst decides is written by you, and everyone gets stuck into you about it.

Hmm... when Danny one-nut (you'll hear the story when the time is right) approaches you on behalf of Blake to ask you out - don't have such a violent reaction, and maybe say yes... just a thought.

Oh, and maybe don't wear our new eight-hole cherry Dr Martens to Founders Day - they get totally scratched up.. it's heartbreaking really.  On second thoughts, it's possibly the cred from the Dr Martens that leads to Blake's (via Danny one-nut) proposition.  Your choice. If you do decide to wear them - Jesus Christ, wear two pairs of socks - those blisters hurt like you wouldn't believe.

Last of all - I just want to tell you not to worry so much about everything - it absolutely doesn't help. I promise you that the stress and the tears are not worth it.  Secondly, you don't always have to be perfect - remember that most of all. When you get to year 12, you let the looming TEE score rule you way too much - it is not the be-all and end-all that you think it's going to be.  On a side note, we get 89.85 - that's a pretty fucking good score. Which, we evidently don't make use of anyway (but that's a whole other letter... and a whole lot more counselling). Remember, remember, Mum and Dad just want to see you happy.  Be happy and the rest will follow.

Oh yeah, don't stop learning flute after year eight - we are actually pretty good at it.  Oh, better still, maybe when you pick your instrument - try to swing percussion instead - you know how much we want to play drums!

And... I'm not sure if this is a good idea or not, but when you and April end up at the train station after a Saturday morning shopping spree - maybe it wouldn't hurt to try a puff of her joint?

Be happy Little Bird, and be yourself.  Not much can go wrong that way.

Love me.

SB xx

a history in letters

Letter writing has been a subject at the fore of my mind recently.  Last night I started Marieke Hardy's new book "You'll be sorry when I'm dead" (she had me at the title... and with that darling cover illustration of her with a flower in her hair - she is a woman after my own heart!).  She writes about her love of letter writing, and even has samples of some of her work.  It made me realise my affinity with it too.

When I was around eight, my favourite cousins in all the world (actually, probably my favourite little people of all time) moved away - their parents had separated and it was all very dramatic and sudden.  I recall writing many letters, drawing pictures and using more stickers than appropriate.  I missed my cousins terribly, and even though they would have been too young to appreciate the letters, I felt this was a way to stay connected.  Back then, it disappointed me that it would take so long to get to them - even before the age of SMS and email, I had been an impatient young Aries.  I wanted them to know I missed them, I wanted them to feel the love on the page, I wanted them to remember me. Consequently, now we have facebook - I barely hear from the young women.  That's modern technology for you.  No doubting that someone who writes you a letter thinks very highly of you. Where have these days gone?

When I was twelve, I was staying at my good friend Tilly's place, for the weekend.  She had a mega crush on the class hottie (I had worked through my crush for that fella long beforehand, so it was ok) and we decided it would be a great idea to write him a secret love letter.  From recollection, we composed our letter, typing it up on pretty paper, sealing it inside a pretty envelope and planted lipstick kisses on the outside.  We walked the many blocks to the young mans house and daringly dropped it in his letter box!  Oh, the scandal it caused at school on Monday!  People had their suspicions, but I held true to my friend - we denied all involvement - I may have even provided her with an alibi!  Eventually Tilly cracked and owned up, I don't think she ever got the guy - but she did earn some cred for being ballsy enough for the letter act.

I would've been about fifteen when "The Body" - that is, Elle Macpherson came to my home town as part of a huge tourism campaign.  There was a lot of hype about the whole thing, she was paid an ungodly amount of money - everyone went to see, just to catch a glimpse.  At the time, I was semi-disgusted with the fuss, so I wrote a letter/witty account of the day and sent it into the then cult-ish magazine 'Recovery'. It must've been published, because I received an Alanis Morissette album in the post shortly after. WOW!

As a teenager, writing letters in class was a given. Even in the presumed silence of a classroom, you could share a joke, plans, sadness and pain. Think about how thrilling it was - will I get caught... will the recipient giggle uncontrollably? If someone was having a rough day, a simple "are you ok?" on a scrap of paper could change it all.  I wish people would do that in the adult world - leave a subtle sticky note here and there from time to time - imagine finding an handwritten joke under your keyboard, an "I'm sorry", "hang in there", a simple smiley face, or God willing, an "are you ok?" If I get married, and have kids someday - I'll be sure to be the kind of wife and mum to sneak in a secret note from time to time. I don't think there is anything more exciting than receiving a handwritten note that you aren't expecting.

During my final years of high school, I stupidly took geography as a TEE subject.  The teacher we had was appalling on so many levels.  Creepy, sleazy, dim-witted and completely useless when it came to equipping us with any knowledge.  One day, something happened in class that drove me to absolute fury.  During the free period that followed I penned a multi page letter to this horrid teacher - laying out the realities I felt he needed to hear.  I didn't write it with the intention of giving it to him - it was an exercise to preserve sanity on my part - but when I showed it to my good friend to read, somehow this letter got passed around and around; people were applauding me, telling me I should be a lawyer (eeek!) one even took a photocopy to keep for herself because she was so impressed with its contents.  My friends convinced me to give the letter to the teacher - I did.  Nothing ever came of it. No reprimand for me, or the teacher.  It died a quiet death - I suspect because I was a top student and they could hardly punish me for pointing out facts they already knew, but declined to act upon. Phew - that pen sure was mighty - but it didn't shed the blood that I expected it would.

Shortly after finishing high school was around the time I proper dropped my bundle.  There wasn't a name for it - I kind of denied the problems, but it was pretty clear I was going through something.  Home life was really tense and emotional.  I would bite my parents heads off before dissolving into heavy tears; sometimes I could sink into myself for an entire weekend and barely utter a word that wasn't dragged out of me. My Mum isn't the most perceptive lady, she's not really geared to understand emotions or the complexities about how thoughts affect feelings.  It's not a dig on my Mother, she was just never told to think about herself or her internal environment, when I talk about issues like these with her, she goes blank because she simply doesn't get the connection.  Anyway - one day she'd gotten to her wits end with me, and said something like "I don't know what's wrong with you... I don't understand why you are this way".  It cut me deeply that I was affecting confusion on others, let alone myself.  In the clarity of bed time, I wrote my parents a letter - apologising, and tried to explain as best I could, that I just didn't know why I was this way.  I hid the letter in a place I knew my Mum would find it.  When she did, she came to me, she told me I wrote a very good letter. It saved me in that moment.

I would've been about 20 when a bombshell hit.  One of my best friends from high school, someone like me in so many ways - tried to commit suicide.  We had lost our closeness, she moved to the city for university, I stayed behind to sort my shit out - but it hit me like a tonne of bricks.  This news came about from a series of strange emails - a distressing one from her and one from a friend of hers I had never met, who had written to explain what had happened.  Evidently, it wasn't the first time she'd tried it - her life had fallen apart and I hadn't seen it and I couldn't stop it from happening.  I felt so helpless.  I remembered a time I was staying over her house when we were younger, we had made gingerbread men and had a crazy afternoon baking and decorating.  The only way I could think of reaching my friend who had seemingly departed to a place where I couldn't reach her, was to bake her a box of gingerbread men and post it off to her, with a very long letter. I didn't know what to say - but I tried to say 'stick around'. The letter and accompanying cookies were my metaphorical hands reaching out to hold hers. So many hopes went with that letter.

Obviously the most recent earth-shattering letter was 'The John Bomb'.  My express posted little envelope of heart and truth; the ramifications of which have been well documented here.

In my time, I have written letters to loved ones, friends, enemies, myself and even God. Each time they have been a release - a wish to affect change - change in attitude, change in heart, change in understanding - in both myself and others.

God how I wish more people would write what they feel. And I really wish they would write to me...

SB xx

inked

I've been reading a book called 'Some Girls' by Jillian Lauren.  Admittedly I found it difficult to connect with this story... that is, until the author started talking about her tattoos.

I love a quote in the book that states "the tattoo gods announce themselves to you when it's time".  Jillian detailed her growing 'need' to be tattooed - her desire to belong to the secret club; to make a permanent statement. This, I could understand.

It was late 2009 when the tattoo gods seriously inspired me.  I always knew that I wanted a tattoo eventually, but I also understood that I needed to be sure about what I was getting, before I did anything.

This is the tattoo that started it all for me.

I know, kind of lame to be inspired by a teeny tatt on the arm of super gorgeous model Tara Moss... but, what can I say, it planted a seed.  I started researching, and the more I found, the more I wanted a peacock feather.  Peacock feathers are said to be a mark of self acceptance; pride in oneself; belief in ones beauty, strength and resilience; it was everything I wanted to declare to the world, and to myself; it was going to be my reward - something beautiful to come from the turmoil.  Before the year was out I had a booking made with a tattooist, I was finally sure.

The appointment I made coincided with a trip to the city and I only had that one day before I had to return home.  Unbelievably, I went to a place I'd never sighted before, to an artist I'd only just met, who spoke broken English - it could have gone so wrong, but it didn't (thankfully).

Sometimes when I get down, I have to remind myself why I got my tattoo, why this particular design?  It was my secret statement to say I'm proud of who I am... I remember the pain of the three hour sitting, hugging onto that leather pillow, feeling every inch of the scratching and burning - one hell of a way to prove something.  If the memories aren't enough, I glance in the mirror as I undress - to seek out my permanent memento; sitting atop my right shoulder, curling it's way to the centre of my back is a brilliantly coloured peacock feather. My feather. My fears, my pain, my relic.  As Jillian Lauren writes perfectly "I got my tattoo not to say 'I wuz here', a tag on a freeway overpass, but rather to say 'Here wuz me'.  Here they are, the landscapes inscribed behind my eyes... with my tattoos, I serve as witness and documentarian to myself."

I know I'll get another someday, when the time is right - another marking on the map of my life.

here was me

SB xx

My literary twin

I recently finished reading a book called 'Jennifer Johnson is sick of being single', written by Heather McElhatton. I'm quite proud of myself, because I finished it very quickly, which is unusual for me, given that in any one sitting, I usually fall asleep midway through my third page.

Aside from being terribly funny in parts, I felt a particular connection to the main character - Jennifer Johnson. As the title implies, Jennifer is over being single; she's had some disastrous dating experiences, works in a squirm-worthy organisation and manages to find herself in awkward situations all the time. I'm not much of a book reviewer, so I'll spare the synopsis - suffice to say Jennifer aches so badly for things to change that when she arrives at the place she thought she wanted, she loses sight of herself. The story kind of shat me off, with the way that it ended imperfectly (not unlike life), but it did make me think about why we strive for the things we do.

I hope that upon arriving in an 'ideal' StrangeBird version of the world, that if it does not deliver what is right and good - that I will have the sense to keep searching. The distance between here and there is vast and immeasurable, but I'd like to think, that if I remain true to myself along the way, that any change in destination will be because it is best.

Some of my favourite quotes from the book

After being caught in an embarrassing position:
"If I had one wish it would be that a sniper would shoot me right now, right here."

Letting her mind wander during a staff meeting:
"What if, for some reason, I had to sleep with Carl? What if a meteor hit the planet and killed almost everyone, except for a group of crazy people, like Mormons or something.... I would have to let the opossum nudge my nether region.  I would have to open my legs and let that hairless, sightless mole creature..."

During a playful fight:
"Well, why don't I just not talk at all? I say.  I'll just be mute.  I shall be Mutey McMuterson from Mutington Downs."

A perfect moment:
"I'm illuminated and floaty, the world full of possibility.  It's almost hard to be this happy.  Right here, right now, this suddenly.  It's almost painful, like after years of darkness, the light hurts your eyes."

A theory:
"I think your God-given right when you get old is to be difficult.  I myself can't wait to be eighty and never have to help anyone again."

Illusions over:
"...like how castaways eventually accept their situations.  After a certain amount of time you have to stop scanning the horizon with hope and just go build a palm-frond shelter... at some point you just have to go lie down in the freaking palm fronds."

It's like we are the same person...

SB xx

Prime Crimes

It's been a tumultuous week this week. I have bounced from crazy highs to deep lows with a vast array of anxiety ridden moments in between. I haven't written about it, because I haven't really known what to say; I still don't.

I found myself hating my job, and myself for being where I am. Don't get me wrong, I love what my job looks like on paper, and I love the ladies I work closely with - but the rest of the world doesn't seem to have the deep appreciation for my occupation, that I think it deserves. In my world, I am a non-university graduate, in a sea of university trained professionals. Most of them are ok, most of the time - but each and every one still thinks they are better than me at some point - and it sucks balls when they all do this at the same time!

I feel in my next life, like I want to come back to be someone super important and integral in peoples lives and well being. When I'm watching a medical show on the TV, I want to be the awesome surgeon saving lives. It's not an ego thing, I really just want to feel like I make a difference to people. I hope that someday soon, the realisation will come to me, that we don't have to have a special certificate and a whopping HECS bill to show we can be amazing.

I have been reading "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie" and while I'm finding it hard to stay focused, it is proving interesting. I feel like this is the time in my life, when I should be at my 'prime'... but hell, at this point, I'm not even sure I'm in the same neighbourhood!

Everything I do, appears to be in the spirit of crimes against my 'prime'. I worry a lot, and I don't like unpredictability, I don't love or trust quickly, I don't open up easily... I don't really like people. Which has me wondering - when is it my prime-time? and will I know it when it arrives??

SB xx

That's How

In a little over a week, I managed to read one crazy book called "This is How" by M.J. Hyland. And in a word (an inarticulate word at that... whoa!)

I can't actually remember the last time I read a book that compelled me to read it, and one too, that hit many nerves along the way.

It's an unassuming book by first appearances, but when the story about Patrick, a man who seemingly teeters on the line separating sanity from madness, unfolds, it hits you were it hurts. Because he's just like anyone, he's just like any one of us that snaps and makes a bad decision. And in his case, a decision which has dire consequences.

This book scares the shit outta me, because I think I could so easily make a Patrick decision. On those days, where I don't feel completely right, where I just want to be able to control things, even the small things, I can almost see myself being irrational like he was. This book resonates with me, and that fact alone, scares me.

Today, I heard that SpottyApple is leaving my work area and moving into another at the same premises. Ordinarily, this would've been ok with me (because I do wish she'd just piss off out of my general planetary vicinity) - but she's leaving us when things are about to head into a complete state of madness. This does not sit well with me; in the StrangeBird 'rulebook' this action screams selfish bitch.... and that's fine - because we all have our own rulebooks, but the problem is, I didn't really keep that internal. I reacted 'badly' and even though I stand by the way I feel, I wish I hadn't said what I said. I wish I had kept the guarded wall up, and bitten my tongue - even though what I really wanted to do was smack her upside that smug stupid face of hers. So, you see, that's how crazy people, like me, like Patrick - can make bad choices in the heat of the moment.

And this is how.. my day started. Fucktastic!

I'm going to keep my mouth shut and my wits about me, because there is no sense getting riled up about shitty people and their shitty decisions.

Peace, out -

SB xx