Today

Stay in the present. Today all we have to deal with is today.

Great in theory.

Weeping Willows

I’m a journalism student. That means I make it my business to read as much as I can and as often as I can. So what have I learned from subscribing to a multitude of papers?

It’s not the reading of the papers that takes the time.

Seeeuuuuuwipppp goes another 3 kilograms of newspaper into the recycling. Out with ‘Drive’ – I don’t do it or read it; Sport – hmm a bit like ‘Drive’ really – in fact, it’s a damn good thing there isn’t a ‘Sex’ section come to think of it – that would be another 800 grams of garbage; I browse over the Real Estate section – nope - not buying or selling at the minute. Seeuuuuwippp!

Where’s my horoscope? Now there’s some riveting stuff.

Business and Money – having spent all of mine on newspapers – seeeuuuwipppp!

Health. Travel. Look at that - ‘The Ten most annoying diseases you can catch on Spring day while picking parsley on a hilltop with a dozen Swedish nuns.

Opinions. Editorial. Letters. I put them all aside to read last.

Down to the last 300 grams of newsprint and what do you know? It’s the news section.

Happy Birthday David

I went to my mate David's 50th birthday this weekend. What a great night. It was held at David's in the country. In a huge garage - the 'big shed' - but is it a garage? It's the size of a barn I guess. Reuniting with people whose teenage kids are now adults and whose little kids are now teenagers. Good people and a lot of them. And we all love the guy.

I learned a few things:
A. Karaoke sounds much better when you join in.
B. Red wine doesn't taste as bad as I thought. Might have something to do with the amount of white that had passed through my lips previously.
C. Some of the old photos of David which I was given to produce a DVD were not of David. His mother pointed out a few of them were 'the neighbours kids'!

In the morning, I silently congratulated myself on not losing it when my daughter crowed her regular, ‘The sun is up, the sun is up!’

We all met back the big shed, showing different levels of tolerance to our different levels of lack of sleep. Some of us were very throaty. Not the kind of throaty that follows singing, but rather the kind that follows a good football match. Most of us were quiet and appreciative of the kind natured bodies who were making breakfast on the barbie.

I look at my daughter, sparkly and ready for action no matter what time it is. She’s smiling at me with her signature vegemite mark on the side of her mouth. Maybe we could market a body lotion. “The essence of youth – a teaspoon of glitter and one dollop of vegemite in every jar”.

From Where I'm Standing

Discipline. No. Not much discipline here. Write and post everyday? Ha!

I’ve come to understand that writing is like unpacking the brain and there’s a lot of junk in there – a garage sale is looking good, just now.

How awesome is it when a line from a song or a movie or a book really grabs you. When, amongst your friends, a line turns into a reference point that you can always return to, that magically and automatically transports to the mood of that moment in time.

There’s been a lot of that today. I’ve been compiling a tribute for a friends 50th. The memories are doing my head in.

This week has been all about labour. Labours of love amongst other things. Great things – motivating stuff – just LOTS of it. I’m feeling inspired and exhausted at the same time.

I love my life. It’s great and it’s all mine. Sometimes I feel like I don’t belong in it though – I’m somewhere in the third person. Mind, that’s a handy place to be – it’s like a mental anaesthetic…

'Husky Nutmeg stifled someone once. Lost in something disguised as the real thing she became quite deranged and as an act of tenderness, made for her ‘subject’ (as you should never treat anyone as an ‘object’) of affection, three million origami figurines (Husky Nutmeg is so unsmooth – even her acts of love are daggy). It was like a burial before the burial. Very sad.'

Just once in a while, I step back into the shoes I’m wearing and feel the blisters.

In ‘Wrong Bet’, when Claude says, “I want to take you away from all this ugliness”, mmm hmmm I was right there.