Fear is the main source of superstition, and one of the main sources of cruelty. To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom.

This duck has seen better days. Geilston Bay, November 2010.

Yesterday, circumstances compelled me to break routine and catch a couple of buses in the middle of the day, rather than my usual ‘commuter rush’ times. In terms of heading into the city from the eastern shore, the bus was sparsely populated.

The (relative) absence of people – coupled with the fact that I forgot my book – meant that I was fortunate enough to experience one side of a delightful telephone conversation. The delightful young women at my end appeared to be suffering from a terrible affliction that meant she only had access to six words. Tragically, one of the words started with ‘f’; another, ‘s’; but her favourite word began with ‘c’.

Unfortunately for the other passengers, despite her proficiency as a first-rate conversationalist, those words her brain permitted her to use were not “foudroyant”, “sempiternal” or “chiaroscuro”.

Perhaps this might explain her extreme agitation (bordering on rage) at what seemed to be her significant other. Indeed, much of the discussion revolved around a child, a sweet little angel named “Shar-nay-a”. It seems that Sharnaya told grandma the night before to “go and get f…..d”. Regrettably, for grandma, Sharnaya was not wanting granny to “go and get focused for the big game on Friday”.

However, my favourite aspect of the tête-à-tête was its dénouement. There is something magical about a relationship if one can tell someone (multiple times) to “f….n kill yourself then c..t”, but sign off with a tender “I love you babe”.

Love indeed is grand.

Comments

Kris McCracken said…

I just need to be held.

17 December 2010 at 15:03

Ah, Joe, you never knew the whole of it...

I still have the robot on the job. Here you can see the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery . And here is a poem: Soliloquy for One Dead Bruce Dawe Ah, no, Joe, you never knew the whole of it, the whistling which is only the wind in the chimney's smoking belly, the footsteps on the muddy path that are always somebody else's. I think of your limbs down there, softly becoming mineral, the life of grasses, and the old love of you thrusts the tears up into my eyes, with the family aware and looking everywhere else. Sometimes when summer is over the land, when the heat quickens the deaf timbers, and birds are thick in the plumbs again, my heart sickens, Joe, calling for the water of your voice and the gone agony of your nearness. I try hard to forget, saying: If God wills, it must be so, because of His goodness, because- but the grasshopper memory leaps in the long thicket, knowing no ease. Ah, Joe, you never knew the whole of it... I like Bruce Dawe. He just my be my favourite Austral...

There was nothing left. No reason, no conscience, no understanding; even the most rudimentary sense of life or death, good or evil, right or wrong.

Here is a self portrait. I’m calling it Portrait of a lady in a dirty window . Shocking, isn’t it? However, it is apt! Samhain , Nos Galan Gaeaf , Hop-tu-Naa , All Saints , All Hallows , Hallowmas , Hallowe'en or HALLOWEEN . It’s Theme Thursday and we’re talking about the festivals traditionally held at the end of the harvest season. Huh? No wonder Australians have trouble with the concept of HALLOWEEN. For the record, in my thirty-two L O N G years on the planet, I can’t say I’ve ever seen ghosts ‘n goblins, trick ‘n treaters or Michael Myers stalking Tasmania’s streets at the end of October. [That said, I did once see a woman as pale as a ghost turning tricks that looked like Michael Myers in late November one time.] Despite the best efforts of Hollywood, sitcoms, and innumerable companies; it seems Australians are impervious to the [ahem] charms of a corporatized variant of a celebration of the end of the "lighter half" of the year and beginning of the "darke...

In dreams begin responsibilities.

A life at sea, that's for me, only I just don't have the BREAD. That's right, Theme Thursday yet again and I post a photo of a yacht dicking about in Bass Strait just off Wynyard. The problem is, I am yet again stuck at work, slogging away, because I knead need the dough . My understanding is that it is the dough that makes the BREAD. And it is the BREAD that buys the yacht. On my salary though, I will be lucky to have enough dough or BREAD for a half dozen dinner rolls. Happy Theme Thursday people, sorry for the rush.

This will hurt me...

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