Category: Personal

General reflections on life, events and feelings.

What the Storm Left Me

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Source: Unknown

Things I did for the first time today:

  1. Handwrote something (albeit in a very stiff version of my handwriting)
  2. Sang in the shower
  3. Threw a toy for my parents’ dog

– A list written on Sunday March 20, 2016. Around 48 hours later, I was bedridden, unable to speak or move.

On Thursday March 10, just before the end of the working day, my brain sent a cloud of misguided electrical impulses through my synapses. It was a big one, but not altogether out of the blue. I hadn’t quite been feeling myself for a while before that, taking a day off a few weeks earlier to stave off pre-seizure symptoms. I’d actually had a small seizure the week before, but the only impact that was going to have on my life was losing my recently acquired learner’s driving licence.

Sure, it wasn’t the nicest way to start a suddenly extra-long weekend, and I hated that I had freaked out some of my colleagues, but it seemed like it would be no big deal in the greater scheme of things. I have had plenty of seizures in the nine years since I was diagnosed, so I know pretty well what it takes to recover: sleep, and lots of it.

That night, I got just that. The twelve or so hours of solid slumber I got should have had me right as rain the next day, but I was still really off. I spent most of the day eating ice cream and trying to write stuff for BMA, but I was still really tired. My speech was still shot and my motor skills came and went, right through the day. I figured it was just a bit of extra lag, but when it continued into the next day, then Sunday, I knew something wasn’t right. The storm hadn’t passed.

My dad arrived in Canberra on the Monday. It was Canberra Day, so I didn’t have to worry about work, but it quickly became clear that heading back to the office in the new week was unlikely, if not impossible. I tired quickly, regularly needing naps to keep myself on something resembling an even keel. I struggled to eat with a knife and fork, and found communication difficult. It felt like my speech wasn’t just getting caught up in my tongue or in my throat, but in some secret cavity in the back of my head, which meant every word made my body shudder with the effort of projecting it out of my mouth. Dad quickly became very good at the “Finish Noni’s Words and Sentences For Her” game. He took me to my GP, then to get blood tests, then to get a CT scan. All of those came back clear.

The Friday after St Patrick’s Day, I had a shower, then headed out to the dining table for breakfast, but it quickly became clear that I wasn’t going to be eating any of it. I had lost all fine motor function. I couldn’t even use a spoon. Naturally, this made me incredibly distressed, which led to another seizure, and I was taken by ambulance to Calvary Hospital. More blood tests, some fluids, some antibiotics, but no answers.

After I was discharged that afternoon, Dad drove me back to Dubbo.

I had an MRI today. It was a really good example of the high stimulus situation I can’t be in right now.

– A note written for this blog on Monday March 21. The MRI machine was so loud that I went in with only a little trouble with speech, but came out barely able to stand, weeping and completely unable to communicate.

Being back home with my parents is a double-edged sword. They can keep an eye on me and are always there for support, taking me to appointments and planning the next move, but with more people comes more stimuli to trigger me back into being helpless and unable to communicate, or walk.

This post has taken me over a week to write, and not just because there is so much to tell. My fine motor skill issues have made typing difficult. The struggle to deal with multiple trains of thought and complex concepts has made writing for any long period of time impossible. My two hospital stays have robbed me of time, sleep and access to writing materials. Emotions are running high, and that doesn’t help either. My current condition is certainly less than conducive to any kind of productive work.

But here we are. It’s written, and I’ve found myself a little victory.

The reason for my prolonged post-seizure symptoms is still a mystery. I’m hoping to get some answers, or at least some new avenues of investigation, from my neurologist when I see them in Sydney on April 5th. Until then, Mum and I are investigating the possibility of speech therapy, and I’m trying to work out how I can ease myself back into the sensory overload that used to be the glorious world I lived in.

All this is progress, but every night I know that all I can do is go to bed, hope, and brace myself for the challenge of tomorrow.

*****

Coincidentally, or ironically, all of my troubles have occurred in March, which is Epilepsy Awareness Month, which culminated in Purple Day on March 26th. If you’d like to make a contribution to an organisation that helps people with the condition, now is the perfect time.

Epilepsy Action Australia and Epilepsy ACT have both been important in my personal journey, however there are plenty of related groups in Australia and around the world that could do with your support.

Epilepsy Action Australia: http://www.epilepsy.org.au/

Epilepsy ACT: http://www.epilepsyact.org.au/

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Ready to go… nowhere?

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Clean desk. A good start.
Clean desk. A good start.

Today is the last day of my week off work. I turned 26 last Sunday, and since that was a strange sort of milestone (one that deserves its own explanation) and I had been working my arse off at work for the last month, I figured I deserved a Break with a capital ‘b’.

It’s been an odd nine days: delightful most of the time, but more sobering towards the end. I spent Saturday through Thursday in Sydney, seeing bands and Men of Letters, going to a neurology appointment (not as dreadful as it sounds), hanging out with my wonderful mum, seeing friends I haven’t seen in ages and meeting new ones.

Friday and Saturday were spent almost entirely in bed, with a brief writing sprint on Saturday morning, before whiling away the late afternoons and evenings by binge listening to The Black Tapes Podcast or jumping between series on Netflix. It was these two days that marked the biggest shift in my mood; I had gone from blissfully plodding through my daily itinerary to flipping between being edgy and numb in the space of what felt like no time at all. Such are the perils of having a neurological condition, I guess.

Despite all the wonderful things I’ve felt and experienced over the last week, I have found myself frustrated. Part of the reason why I took this week off was to work on personal projects: writing blogs, recording audio for a new podcast I’m working on, finishing diaries and getting a new study space in order. This post means I’ve got the first one done (although I guess you could also count the two pieces I wrote for BMA), the second has gotten absolutely nowhere, and I’ve barely made a scratch on the diaries and writing space, even if I did finally manage to get hold of a desk (see above).

One of the projects I wanted to get done... More to come.
One of the projects I wanted to get done… More to come.

Now that I write all that down, I realise I’ve done a lot more in the last few days than I initially thought. It’s definitely far more than I have managed over the last few weeks and months, but I feel like that’s more of an indictment of my laziness, poor mood and terrible management of non-work time and energy rather than any great recent wave of progress.

This frustration has caused me to revisit the memories of the dark days of 2012/13, when I was living at home, depressed and disillusioned. Even though they were the worst ten months of my life, towards the end I was starting to work out how to manage my own time and energy to build personal projects. I was building Gigs Out West in a very slow but steady fashion, starting to do copywriting and voicing jobs for my dad, and I had enough confidence to start applying for jobs again. At the time, I knew that this ‘floating’ time was important, but now I’m stuck wondering what it might have turned into had I stuck with it rather than returning to the conventional workforce.

Until recently, I was sure that I probably would have got absolutely nowhere, but now I’m starting to wish I’d taken it a little bit further. I wish I had more time and far more energy and drive to develop freelancing skills and a resilience that could open new options outside the usual employer/employee working dynamic.

Coming to the end of this week away from the office, I feel like I am ready, just like I was as I came to the end of that ten month period in 2013, to start doing things off my own back. I’m refreshed enough that I have the energy to write my first blog in months, and I’m keen to start sitting down and making stuff at the times that suit me best, like late at night without the worry of having to get up in the morning. I’m ready to explore new ways of thinking and making content, reading and writing and trying to make myself into the person I want to be.

But all the optimism in the world won’t make the following facts go away:

  1. I have to go to work on Monday morning.
  2. I don’t have the money to make that leap into the unknown.
  3. Even if I did have the money to make that jump, would I really be able to afford to take the time I’d need to recalibrate and refresh beforehand?

That’s what has really bothered me for the last few days: just as I’m getting ready to start work on reaching for new horizons, the reality of employment obligations and my financial situation comes up and taps me on the shoulder to remind me that I don’t have the right or the ability to go forth and be an explorer.

The idea that this is how I’m going to spend the next 40+ years of my working life terrifies me even more than the concept of death.

For now, I’m refreshed and ready to get things done, even if it’s a feeling that only lasts for another 24 hours or so. It feels like a waste to use this new energy on housekeeping, but if I can do that, maybe I can get to the next stage?

So despite my misgivings, I am spending today cleaning my room, moving my new desk into place, doing washing and cleaning my bathroom. I have to learn to celebrate the little successes I have when I’m up and going, and then try to keep them rolling. Once I’ve got those sorted, then hopefully everything else will be that little bit easier.

Let's roll.
Let’s do this.

Let’s Start At The Beginning – Blog Carnival 2014

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You Can Do This

I’m not good at making plans. I’m someone who lives so much in the present that I’ve found myself at a point where I don’t know where to go with my future.

Yeah, we’ve been down this road before, but hear me out, just one last time. (At least, I hope it’s the last time…)

I am currently working on a plan like nothing I’ve ever done before. Okay, it’s kind of like something I’ve done before, but it’s different. It’s going to need organisation and plotting and vision and the kind of drive and work ethic that I’ve seen so many of my friends apply to their creative projects but has always eluded me. It’s a new project that I’ve only told a few friends and family about. I’m not quite ready to tell everyone the details yet, but it’s something that has been bubbling away in my brain for a good few months.

Now I’m finally ready to start putting my back into it.

To be honest, it’s not the ideal time to be starting seriously on something like this. I’ve been pretty emotionally fragile lately, and I’m pinning a lot of hope on this being something that drags me out of my funk. If it doesn’t, I’m going to be in quite a spot of bother, but optimism is the key right now.

I don’t know how I’m going to fit it around the fact that I really need to clean my bedroom and my bathroom, make sure I’m feeding myself decent home-cooked meals rather than buying fast food on the way home, or maintain the kind of social life I rely on to make sure I don’t slip into feeling completely isolated in the way that has been slowly creeping into my heart lately. I don’t know how I’m going to budget it around some of my newer financial commitments, or how I’m going to fit it around the fact that I really do seem to need a lot of sleep at the moment. Like I said, this is an endeavour fueled by hope that I can do it, with the occasional burst of I need this to work so that I can get a little bit closer to doing what I want to do full time as a booster.

I’m taking a week off work at the start of August to go home and spend some time with my family, but I’m hoping that it will also be a good time for me to get up and get some work done on this. I want to have the bare bones all laid out by the end of August so that I can start saving for and purchasing the equipment I’m going to need to make this thing work.

Right now, I’m marking out my process, the steps I’m going to have go through in order to get on the right path for this to work. I have to set up a work space and allocate the time I’m going to give to this, whether it be small chunks on weeknights or an extended period once a week on a Saturday or Sunday. I have to do an inventory of the resources I currently have, work out what I need to buy to fill out the rest of my requirements and start looking at the financial options I have to acquire them. I need to start looking for guides and mentors who’ve done this before who are going to be able to help me. I need to start plotting out the format, the progression of thoughts and phases of development. I need to see if I can actually turn this into some kind of business plan, but even if I can, that’s a long way off.

These are all things I’m not used to, and I’ve never really done before. Until now, I’ve always flown by the seat of my pants. I’m trying to totally change the way I work through things, and it’s a shift that I have to make in order to get this thing to work in the way I want and need it to.

My mum has always been keen on planning-related sayings. Fail to plan and you plan to fail. Proper planning prevents poor performance. She’s rattled them off to me a bunch of times, but it’s only now that I’m in enough of a career rut that I’m really starting to see just how important it is sometimes to get past just planning a day or a short term project with a deadline that finishes once it’s completed. For the first time in a long time, I’ve started thinking about longer term goals and how I’m going to reach them. This is me starting to play the long game, with 6 month and 12 month and 5 year goals and all that other stuff that I have always thought to be a pile of wank. Unlike back in high school, when the decision had to be made swiftly and securely, I now know myself well enough to understand what those goals are, how realistic they are and just how I can go about achieving them. I have more knowledge, more contacts and more resources than ever before, and now if the time to use them.

It’s new and it’s scary, and I’m almost inevitably going to fuck it up. But planning is not only necessary to the execution of this idea, it’s one of the core concepts behind it. I’m making a new adventure for myself, but this time I’m not just running blindly into the woods in the hope that I’ll find the things I’m looking for just by flailing around.

For the first time, I’m leaving home with a map. It won’t be perfect, and I’m sure I’ll fall off the trail from time to time, but the idea of being my own personal cartographer is intriguing and challenging and just what I need right now.

I can’t wait to see where it takes me.

*****

It’s taken almost a year for me to get there, but this blog post marks the end of my contributions to Alexandra Neill’s Blog Carnival collaboration project. THEY SAID IT WOULD NEVER HAPPEN. (“They” = me.)

If you want a refresher on what Blog Carnival was, this is where you need to click your mouse.

Siren Songs

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Image: zen Sutherland.
Image: zen Sutherland.

I live about a block and a half from a fire station. Because we’re on a relatively busy road (not the main drag, but a street many people take to avoid it), we also get a lot of other emergency vehicles going past on the way to events elsewhere in the Inner North.

The sirens are nowhere near constant, but they aren’t entirely irregular either. They don’t wake me up when they go off at night, and they’re almost always still novel, and kind of reassuring, even after living in this house for almost 2 years. I don’t know any people who drive them, and I can’t quite tell which sound belongs to which vehicle from which service (although I am getting better at picking it). Yet strangely, they feel like home now.

Where I am currently living is as close to city living as I have ever been. I’m about to get even closer, moving into a flat closer to the CBD and the main thoroughfare in a matter of weeks.

As time ticks away to my move, I begin to wonder: am I a city person now?

I don’t think I am. I still crave being able to look up and see the stars without the glare of millions of streetlights. I still find comfort in the green paddocks that separate Canberra’s haphazard patchwork of suburbs, and I don’t mind that the middle of town doesn’t seem to have any buildings higher than about ten storeys.

But then I hear the sirens. I hear the rumbling of cars going down the avenue out the front of my house. I see the planes humming as they come into the airport. I hear the fireworks from the lake. I wander the streets and find little nooks and alleyways I hadn’t noticed before. I hear my heels clop on Civic’s tiles; I feel the cobblestones of Manuka’s back streets through the thin soles of my flats. I wander into familiar pubs and don’t see a single face I know beyond the bar staff. I taste new things. I hear new things. I read and talk and find places to hide from those whose opinions I find distasteful. I find new people when I cannot find a place to hide. I have discovered so much here, and I have found so much of myself in its grey and in its colour.

But Canberra is a safe city. Its enclaves and cliques, once infiltrated, are warm and comfortable and safe. I want to foster what I have here, but I don’t want to put down roots.

Not yet.

I want to hear more sirens. I want to hear the way the police come to your aid in other countries, the sound of panic in so many languages. I want to listen to hear if the sound of car wheels on asphalt is different in other climates, on different kinds of road.

When I go Home to visit my family, I notice the silence left by the lack of sirens. I wasn’t in this house when my parents lived on acreage, so I can’t compare that silence with the quiet they still have now they live in town. There, the only real noise is the screaming matches the neighbours engage in on a semi-regular basis, but even that can be blocked out with their fancy new roller shutters. It seems strange to be locked in by an invention made for the city in a town of just over 30,000 people.

The quiet of Home doesn’t help me sleep. I miss the drone of occasional traffic. The silence unnerves me now. It reminds me of how I want to run. It makes me want to run back to my City With The Man-Made Lake.

But I’m here now. So why am I thinking of running again, but to somewhere even grander?

I wonder if a bigger city would lull me into the land of slumber better than where I am now. More trains, more cars, more planes, more sirens. Would it be my lullaby, or the soundtrack to newfound insomnia?

I wonder when I’ll find out. I wonder how long I’ll live with it.

I know I will come back here eventually. Back to where the occasional sirens mark my safety. I will always come back to this city I have come to love.

But right now I want to chase the engine to the fire, so that I can throw my soul in and send it flying with the embers, up into the night.

In Which She Has The Confrontation Before It Happens

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Click for source.

 

The following is a letter to an unknown subject, and a conversation that is yet to happen.

*****

Why do you keep doing it? Why do you have to share all our secrets with the internet?

I don’t have a satisfactory answer for him/her/them, but I don’t have a satisfactory mind for fiction at the moment, either. All I have right now are memories. So many of them are ripe for retelling, reworking and reinterpreting. There is nobody else living in my head right now, so I only have my own stories to fall back on.

You don’t have to tell everyone everything. You don’t have to write something every day.

Oh, on the contrary. I’ve let myself lie idle for far too long. I need to practice everyday if I can. I need to experiment with form and the way I think about stories, and oil the cogs so they can start turning more easily, all so I can get back to trying to tell the stories pulled from the lives of other characters, rather than being stuck in my own musings.

I don’t need to publish, certainly. But I do need feedback. I need criticism. I need advice and guidance. I’m not going to get that by keeping it all to myself, or by keeping it to those who think I’m already doing well.

Strangely, it’s a lot less confronting throwing it into the online ether than finding a one-on-one mentor. That said, I probably need one of those more than anything else. Until I find one and the courage to ask them, I will simply continue to practice in the public space. I am sure it will open more doors than it closes.

I don’t want to get caught in truncated, unstructured, rambling memoirs, but that’s where I am and I’m running with it. You work with what you’ve got, and these memories are what I have.

Can’t you write non-fiction about other things? You could write about politics, or famous people, or music! You’ve done it before. Why does it have to be about us/your family/your friends/yourself?

I will, and soon. But those things take time, research, resources, passion, and more. Again, my supplies are limited, but I’m trekking towards solutions for most of them. Baby steps, baby. Itty bitty baby steps.

And anyway, nobody even knows it’s you. Nobody knows how many lies are interwoven with my truth. You gave me these moments and I gave you fair warning that they would visit us again from time to time. And here they are.

I know that some will hurt, but maybe some will heal. Perhaps there will be a new peace now that it’s all been pulled apart and laid out like bike parts on the pavement. Maybe you’ll learn something. Maybe I will.

Don’t worry, baby. Don’t let it cloud your thoughts. Let it darken your opinion of me, if that’s what you want, but don’t fret about the marks on your screen. Nobody is paying attention.

Through it all, remember this: it’s just a phase. It will pass and soon I won’t need you to fuel my musings any more. There’s a box of letters under my bed, and that is where I’ll put you, along with all those other wonders, and once you’re there I promise I’ll never share you with strangers again.

Seven Songs

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Seven songs. Seven stories. Some truths. Some lies.

Life On Mars – David Bowie

In bed, we’re tangled. I’ve lost count of the hours, and I’ve lost count of the number of times we’ve done our best to eat each other alive, but I know that I have heard this song twice tonight. The first time was a sub-par cover by a female artist I do not dislike, but this time, it is The Man Himself, singing it how it should be sung.

My eyes are closed, and I see a stage that isn’t there. Performers stand on invisible platforms floating through the air. A grand Grimaldi stands opposite a Pierrot, strangely confident in his stance. Lions and silks and bubbles, all swirling around me, and yet I am not there. It’s all around me, but it’s still distant. It’s like watching television, except that I am surrounded and separated by and from its wonder. I feel like I’m spinning and swirling, draped in loose fitting robes that dance as I soar upwards-

He changes the track and I’m flung out of the trance. I am bitter, but I keep it to myself. The real world doesn’t allow me to float on the wind, but there are worse ways to spend your time than this.

 

Baby I Am Nobody Now – Andy Bull

Up front. Packed in. Sold out. Who would have thought it? Everyone should have thought it – it’s a well deserved warm welcome, and the audience are rewarded with a swathe of sound that twirls softly around us like a silk scarf. I get that hit, reach the little nirvana where I’m not stuck in this clunky body, instead I’m writhing through the air like an ethereal serpent.

The melodramatic metaphors come easily as the backing vocals swoop in to fill out the chorus. The sound is massive, so dense that it feels like it could scoop up underneath us and lift us to the ceiling like a cushion filled with air.

They’re playing their way through a fucking superb album, one that’s lifted even higher by hearing it being played live. I think about hearing it and seeing it again, this time with an orchestra filling out the places where the synths have been, raising the crescendo even higher. I get chills at the thought, on top of those I’ve already got.

I open my eyes and remember it’s still happening. I drink it in, and dance.

 

Cold As Canada – Paul Kelly

In the song, she’s watching him sleep, but he left hours ago. I’m sitting on the side of the bed, and I feel the light creep in through the shutters and hit my back. I didn’t stray like the woman in the lyrics, but that’s only because I was never really here to begin with.

There is no sound, save for my deep breaths and the ensuing sighs that reveal just how deep a hole I’m in. My ears don’t need to hear it; it’s embedded itself in my heart and my head and I just want to collapse in on myself and be wiped from the memory of the world.

Maybe not from the world’s memory. Just his.

I don’t know who’s committed a greater betrayal: the woman who knows what on earth she’s done; or the woman who could do no wrong.

She needs to walk away. She doesn’t know. She doesn’t know when, but it needs to be soon, before the guilt eats her away to nothing.

It doesn’t matter how it happens. There are no winners here.

There’s no good way to say goodbye.

 

He Called Me Baby – Patsy Cline

Three times.

She had always hated the idea of being called that word. She was not a child.

But he said it, and she enjoyed it.

Three times.

She heard someone say once, “You should only use the word ‘baby’ in a song if it’s actually about a newborn.” She was pretty sure it was a bastardised David Byrne quote, but it didn’t matter where it came from. It seemed like a good philosophy.

The first time. She figured it was the heat of the moment. She tried to ignore it. Instead, she loved it. But she winced a little. Something was wrong.

The second time. Now it sounded deliberate, like they were actually going places. She felt warm, glowing despite the cold air, but something was still niggling at the back of her mind.

The third time. The last time. It hit her like a concrete slab.

She wanted to tell him: “You’re not calling me that because you care. You’re saying it because you think it’s the right thing to say, and it would be.

“But you’re not saying it to me. The woman you’re saying it to isn’t here, is she?”

Instead, she just said, “Please, don’t call me that.”

And that was the last time it passed his lips.

 

Grandma’s Herbal Cure All – Moochers Inc

The fact that she would never see these people again intoxicated her to the point that she just let it happen. She danced in the street, tearing her shoes to pieces on the cobblestones, letting her hair fly in the wind.

 

Man Like That – Gin Wigmore

She often thought about the revenge fantasies she would play out on him.

But every time she thought of one, she would find herself taking him back.

It was a dreadful waste of plotting, in her opinion.

In the end, she just threw coffee on him. Easy and effective, cheap and classic. Him and her.

 

Good Intent – Kimbra

New shoes. Black. Small heel. Buckled, not laced.

Old shoes. Black-ish. Smaller heel, more worn on the left side; wobbles when walks. Buckles are buckled, coming undone.

These things that are comfortable never last.

Family Matters

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Christmas 2007
Christmas 2007

I’ve just arrived back in Canberra after a ten day holiday with my family: mum, dad and younger sister. Half of that was spent in Dubbo in my parents’ house, the rest with extended family in Milton on the South Coast of New South Wales. To be honest, this has been one of the few times I’ve come back to Canberra wishing I was somewhere else. It’s only been three-and-a-bit hours since I saw them last, but I am already missing my family incredibly.

I’m constantly reminded just how wonderful it is and how lucky I am to have such a close and loving family. The way we all came together to mourn the passing of my grandfather back in April, the unbelievable support they’ve given me with present and future living arrangements, the career advice, the emotional support through humps in my personal life, and so much more: I’m so lucky to have them to call on when I need to.

After 27 years of marriage, my parents are still together, complete with the tendency to still be stupidly cute. They are a pillar of stability in a life that has been full of wobbles, and I’m so grateful that they’ve been there for me, time and time again.

My sister and I have a curious relationship that rocks back and forth like the world’s biggest see-saw. Sometimes she’s all cuddles and cuteness (I am always all about the cuddles); other times she wants to tear my face off (I don’t want to return the favour quite as often, but I have my moments). We live in a peculiar truce-like situation, ready to spark into a spat at a moment’s notice, but I would still do anything for a hug from her. (Except stop asking for them – she gives wonderful hugs, partly because I have to work so hard for them.)

My extended family are spread right along the Eastern states, with my mum’s family, to whom I am particularly close, all living within 8 hours drive. Most of them are in one of two towns in Western NSW. Knowing that an aunt or uncle or cousin could drop by is a nice feeling, and being so far from them most of the year sucks, especially when things are rough at either end. As my Grannie gets older, I realise that it’s also important that I get back to see her more regularly, but as I only get back to Dubbo once every four to six months or so, that’s really tricky. Seeing family is one of the reasons why I want to get my licence this year – it’s near impossible to hurry back on a 10 hour bus trip that only runs on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.

One of the other things I’d like to do in the next year or so is live overseas. Friends of mine have gone to London, Thailand, New York and so many other wonderful places across the globe, and I want a piece of that.

But I keep coming back to one thing: how far away do I want to be from my family? Canberra is already a long way away – 5 hours by car, 5 hours and a couple of hundred dollars by plane and bus, and 10 hours by public transport. Do I really want to go any further afield? Can I even bear to be away that long, not knowing when I’ll get the chance to fly back and see them again?

Yes. I’m ready for the adventure of living in another country. But it’s all about baby steps: 7 hours of public transport to Sydney, then a 3 hour flight. I think I could do that. I’m ten hours commute away as it is, after all.

But the fact remains: it will be incredibly hard to be so far away from my family. That said, I’d be cheating myself if I didn’t go. They understand that.

And that’s another reason why I love them so bloody hard.

So every day, I count my blessings. This year, I resolve to call my family more often (I can already hear my mother whooping with joy), and write to them more, and do the best I can to spend more time in their company.

Because I have been blessed with falling into their mad lot, and you never know how long they’re going to be around for.

 

*****

IMAG0365
Inspired by a card from Ask Me A Question: 50 cards to start a conversation, from kikki.K.

Looking Back At 2014 – A Boring Stats Post

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If there’s one thing I’m certain about in the world of blogging, it’s that nobody likes posts about statistics. It’s pretty much the only thing that people hate more than posts about how you can be a better blogger – they’re self-aggrandising and kind of patronising and really only interesting to the person posting it.

But I have to confess, I love reading the WordPress yearly summaries. This is (I think) the third year they’ve done one up for me (the previous reports were for Cheaper Than Rubies, which is now defunct), and I actually find them really interesting, and good for my confidence when it comes to the year ahead. Not to mention, it’s a great kick up the arse to get writing again, to try and beat my current records and improve the bits and pieces that I’m putting together.

And holy crap, were there some records broken in this last year. I’m still reeling from some of the numbers that flashed up on my screen in the last six months. (Thank you, New Zealand, you beautiful bunch of bastards. I will definitely be seeing you again soon.)

For me however, the biggest takeaway from this report is that there is a massive problem with spam bots on WordPress. Like, huge. And I’m yet to understand exactly how to combat it, as opposed to this blog’s old place of residence on Blogger, where it was actually pretty easy to remove those blips from my stats. But hey, nobody wants to hear shop talk.

Is this report going to guide what I’m going to write and do in 2015? Absolutely not. I’ve got my own plans that are bubbling and brewing (including finally finishing my Blog Carnival roster from back in August), but most of those will be kept under wraps for the time being. I might try and impose some unspoken rules, but I’ll leave it up to you to work out what those are.

In 2014, I set out to “do things that scare me”. With my first solo international jaunt, many magnificent new friendships, 12 months of writing a regular music column, some terrifying (and awesome) performance-y things, and a number of significant personal confessions behind me, I think I can safely say that I achieved that goal. That is why it’s no longer a new year’s resolution; it’s more of a mantra I’m going to try and carry for the rest of my life. Hopefully, over the next year and beyond, you’ll see the fruits of that resolution on your screens, or maybe in your ears or your eyeballs.

Despite some setbacks, 2014 has been pretty damn brilliant. Now it’s time to make 2015 just as awesome. (Fuck it. Even more awesome than that.)

If you’re a bit of a stats nerd and you’ve been desperately wanting me to cut to the chase and show you the numbers, you can click here to see the complete report.

Happy New Year, one and all. Let’s make this one an absolute killer.

Creative Bravery – Blog Carnival 2014

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“Creative Block” by Elize Vossgatter

Back in August, I was invited by the wonderful Alexandra Neill to take part in her Blog Carnival project, along with a bunch of other writers who are much cleverer and more consistent with the whole writing thing than I am. That project was meant to last the whole month, and reach across five topics. I fell off the wagon after one, and now we’re in the back half of October and I’m writing the second one. Good work, me.

It wasn’t that I didn’t try to write it. I think I took four goes at it, knowing exactly what I wanted to talk about, but with no idea how to go about it. The topic was “Something That Scares Me”, and this thing left me so scared (and more importantly, ashamed) that I couldn’t bring myself to confess it.

It was such a stupid thing that I feel like a moron not being able to share it. It’s something I really struggle with, and I’m trying really hard to get over it, but things keep getting in the way: working full time, stress, exhaustion, procrastination, laziness, a total failing in terms of willpower, fear of the fear itself…

I am afraid of doing things, making things, being creative, having adventures. It’s such a stupid thing to be afraid of, especially when I consider the joy that comes from actually doing it, but the elements of the fear seem endless, and the excuses come in equal number. Yet at the same time, I am terrified of being ordinary, being boring, sacrificing my life to a day job and not doing and making the things my heart wants to. It’s a particularly uncomfortable position to be in.

A little over a week ago, I turned 25. For a number of reasons, that milestone held a lot of dread for me, especially as it crept closer and I realised just how few of the things I’d wanted to achieve had actually come to fruition. As I write, I realise that I’m even afraid to confess that they are things I want to do, but here are some of them:

I’ve never been published by a publication that will pay me for my work. I’ve left four novels unfinished, and never finished editing the only one that I did finish. I’ve never played in a band. I’m yet to live overseas. I’ve never made a short film that was any more than a glorified slideshow. I’ve not made any wonderful pottery,made a sculpture or fixed something mechanical, or learned how to ride a bike, or how to drive a car. I never got to be a radio announcer or program producer. I can’t do a handstand or a cartwheel or rock climb. I’ve never tried stand-up comedy. I’ve never learned how to swing dance or any of the Latin ballroom styles. I never learned to juggle. I’ve never acted in a role beyond the chorus, and I haven’t even done that since I was in high school. I’ve never organised a successful public event or gig. I’m painfully aware of all the things I want to do I haven’t done yet, and I feel like I am running out of time to do them.

Writer's Block II
“Writer’s Block II” by Drew Coffman

That’s what scares me: all those things left undone. As I get older, I feel like my potential is ebbing away; any talent I may have is disintegrating like muscles atrophying, and every day that ticks by makes me more anxious about what I’m missing out on. I’m surrounded by wonderful, clever, driven, creative, fantastic, unbelievable people (some of whom I am lucky enough to call friends, some of whom have just been rad enough to let me hang in their presence) who inspire and intimidate me in equal measure. They are musicians, writers, filmmakers, event-organising magicians, public relations wizards, actors, models, photographers, poets, circus performers, artists and so much more. I could ask them for help, but I’m paralysed by the thought of revealing that I want to do what they can do because I know that I’m never going to be as good at it as they are. I feel that I’ve left it too late.

I’ve missed plenty of opportunities by not being brave enough to take them, and it’s only been in the last 12 months that I’ve actually started acting on some of them, like writing for BMA, getting stupidly obsessed about a movie and doing insane and wonderful things as a result, putting together a murder mystery party for my friends, sorting out my medication regime and preparing to get clearance to go and get my L’s. But there are so many more things that I’m shoving down and hiding, so many more things that I want to do. It’s not that I don’t have the time or the energy; it’s that I am just too lazy and too afraid of making the changes to my life that I need to in order to do them.

So I find excuses: I don’t have the equipment, I don’t have the time, I don’t have the brains or the creativity, I don’t have the energy. Excuses are easy, but they don’t bring me the rewards and peace I’m looking for.

Often I find the core reason for my apprehension is incredibly simple. I don’t know where to start. It’s hard to get the ball rolling at the best of times, and it’s even harder to ask people how to start. It feels like there’s this implication that starting is easy. You just do the thing! Simple! Make like Nike and just do it!

But it’s terrifying to start. I’m not brave. A friend of mine has a tendency to call people cowards in a comedic fashion during his shows, but every time I hear him say it, it hurts because in my case I know it to be absolutely true. And once you start, where do you go then? When you have no known end to the process, how do you go about stepping through it? I try to think about it and my brain struggles to comprehend it. Where is the reward when there is no set end?

Maybe I’m not cut out to be a creative after all. Perhaps I peaked at sixteen, when I finally finished that shitty novel that now sits on my external hard drive, taunting me with its blatantly uninformed, teenaged angst-filled nonsense. Perhaps there was a catalyst that beat all the boldness out of me and made me so scared of what people think of me. Maybe I just got older and my brain stopped being malleable and free and I forgot how to just go with the flow. Maybe my brain never had the ability to process it in the first place.

Whatever it is, I need to shake it off. It’s not useful in any way. It’s just making me feel bad, and in the last few years I’ve come to be fed up with feeling bad. I want to feel good.

And that means that somehow I have to work out how to start. It means I need to figure out how to keep going.

I need to get to work.

Click for source

Postscript: after I wrote this, I realised that my tagline for this blog is, “Let’s do the things that scare us.” I’m not sure if this is irony, or just completely appropriate. Either way, it’s worth noting, don’t you think?

*****

The theme of “Something That Scares Me” was also covered by the following Blog Carnival writers:

If you want a refresher on how Blog Carnival works, or want to join in: this is where you need to click your mouse.

His Own Aroma

Published on by NoniLeave a comment

 

He smelled like cloves.

Then again, I can’t be sure of that. I don’t know what cloves smell like, but they were exactly what he reminded me of: cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger; all those other warm, comforting spices that go into mulled cider or chai. He smelled delicious and exotic and alluring. Most of all, he smelled warm.

When he came close, I inhaled deeply, trying to embed every nuance of his scent deep within my brain. I was incredibly conscious of whether or not I was breathing in too loudly; I didn’t want him to know just how much I loved dragging him deep into my lungs like cigarette smoke. He was my nicotine. He sent my heart racing. My breathing rate increased and my brain tingled with lust-filled sparks. He didn’t even need to touch me; he just had to be close enough to breathe in. It was intoxicating, sending sensations running through my body from my torso to my fingertips like a sound wave. I could physically feel the pleasure of his aroma rippling through me.

I can’t remember ever smelling him on my skin or on my clothes, only when he was in the room. Every other man I had lusted after or loved had left a trail behind him, but for some reason, he did not. This was probably a blessing. I could have lost hours in his perfume. To have it weave its way into my sheets would have been the end of me.

We still see each other, now and then. His face is still handsome, his conversation still engaging, his sense of humour as dry as when I first met him. He still cuts a canyon through my heart, but it would be deeper if we didn’t speak.

We don’t sit close to each other. There is always a table, a friend or an incense between us, stopping our pheromones from mingling in the air the way they used to. We sit together and talk, but I can no longer smell his warmth. My lungs miss his touch, my breath longs to entwine itself in his, but this is the way things are.

Sometimes when I walk through the spice aisle in the supermarket, I look at the packets on the shelves. I am looking for cloves, but I never buy them. I don’t pick them up, and I don’t let their scent register in my brain. Instead, I exhale hard through my nose, wondering if I was right. I wonder if they smell like him after all.

But I never check. The illusion is better than the reality, and the nostalgia tastes better than the present. In the same way spice preserves meat, protecting it from air and rot, I protect my memories by hiding them from the truth.

 

Spice_cloves