A new writing experience - attention in cyberspace

This week brought a new experience for me as a writer. I have been trying for months to get a post on mamamia.com.au, the popular blog of writer and editor Mia Freedman.

I finally made it last Sunday with a contribution on the wearing (or not) of makeup. Which was a massive thrill of course. As was the barrage of comments my piece received – 221 at last count. As a person who gets excited when she has three comments on a blog post, this was overwhelming, initially in a positive way. After a while I wasn’t so sure, as the tone of many of the comments was, if not downright nasty, then defensive to say the least.

Still, you know what they say about any publicity – and that’s what I told myself when I was feeling a little vulnerable and exposed. If I put myself out there, I need to be tough enough to cope with the flak.

If you’re interested, here’s the link:

http://www.mamamia.com.au/style/eyeliner-is-the-only-thing-in-my-make-up-kit/

Crowds and clouds at the G

It’s years since I’ve been to the footy. I’ve never been a serious fan, but for a while there, footy attendance was a regular part of my life. Last Sunday, I went to pay tribute to Jim Stynes, and found myself swamped with nostalgia.

Jimmy was a big part of our lives in the 90s. We had just moved to Melbourne from the country, and our kids, aged eight to one were of an age to get interested in the football. Our second, a son, rugged individual that he was, followed Essendon; the rest of us went for Melbourne with varying degrees of passion.

That was Jimmy’s decade. He never missed a match, and we watched him week after week. Our oldest, a daughter, wore a Melbourne jumper with Jimmy’s number 11 stitched on the back. We went to a MFC family day at Luna Park and, in between rides, chatted to Jimmy and David Neitz, Shaun Smith and Adam Yze, Garry Lyon and our favourite – the Wizard, aka Jeff Farmer.

We had another good reason to go to the footy. My parents lived on Hoddle Street, a short walk from The G. We parked at their place, caught up with them and then walked to the match, laden with back packs full of food for six – packets of home brand chips, apples, fruit cake, tetra packs of juice and a thermos of coffee for the grown ups.

Needless to say, we took the footy, and all the way the kids and their dad played kick to kick along the quiet, East Melbourne lanes. We had red and blue jumpers, beanies and scarves in abundance, and those little flags that threatened, every time, to put someone’s eye out 

The rule was that we didn’t start eating till quarter time, and after the match, the family would pour onto the ground with the rest of the excited crowd and play kick to kick again. I watched from the stands, mesmerised by the arcs created by multiple footballs, and the seagulls swooping between them.

A check in with the grand-parents and then home in the heavy, post-footy traffic, listening to the post-match commentaries all the way, our scarves flying out the car windows.

Last weekend it was just my husband and me. Dad no longer lives in Hoddle St, so we parked with thousands of other cars in the paddock surrounding the MCG, and all we took for sustenance was a bottle of water. The ground itself has changed since I was there. We used to walk up interminable concrete ramps and stairs to the top; now there are escalators that ascend smoothly past tasteful décor.

The Stynes tribute was beautifully done; the highlight for me being David Bridie’s soulful rendition of ‘Oh Danny Boy’. I thought, as I have numerous times since Jimmy’s death, of what a relief it is to have a sportsman in the news for admirable reasons – a role model in the true sense of the word.

Then the match began. It was vintage Dees, alas. Apart from ten glorious minutes in the third quarter when we piled on goal after goal and caught up with the Bulldogs, it was pretty miserable.

Unlike my husband, who is a true believer, I didn’t really mind. I sat there happily, drinking in the memories of all the matches I had attended over 17 years of living in Melbourne. I had forgotten the living roar that rises from the stands, the power of a groan uttered by every one of 30,000 spectators when a player lands awkwardly on his neck, the held breath of 30,000 as they wait to see whether he will get up of his own accord. 

I had forgotten the furious cry, ‘Ball!’ which seems to be what fans get most upset about, closely followed by ‘In the back!’ I had forgotten how the umpire really does get blamed for everything, the quaint but ferociously yelled ‘You bloody mongrel umpire!’ that was about the most vulgar utterance I heard last Sunday.

I had forgotten that though feelings run high, there is seldom violence between spectators, and that supporters of both teams sit happily in the stands together; a state of affairs that would not be possible for the soccer crowds in Europe and the UK.

Most of all, I’d forgotten the different reasons my husband and I go to watch a football match. I was fascinated by the crowd; the remarkably good looking family in the row in front of us – a father and several adult children, the antics of the kids sitting just behind, the weird guy close by who kept shouting ‘Nathan Jones, I love your bald head!’ 

Even more than crowd watching, the weather provided an endless sound and light show. Last Sunday we had thunder and lightning, rain and sunshine – at one point both at once, as it poured on half the G while the other half was dry. For a few minutes, a glowing double rainbow hung in the heavens for Jimmy, and as the sun set, a series of lurid pink clouds blew across the sky, only metres above where we were sitting at the top of the stands.

‘Look at the clouds, just look at them, they’re fabulous,’ I kept urging my husband who, every time, replied tersely, ‘I’m not here to look at the clouds!’ Finally, to keep me quiet I suppose, he said he’d look at half time. By half time the sunset was long gone, but there was still a spectacular show provided by the MCG lights reflecting off the bellies of the soaring seagulls, sharp and bright against the deep grey of the sky.

It’ll probably be a while before I go to the footy again. The treat of an entire Sunday afternoon with the house to myself is irresistible. But I went home happy – a lot happier than the die-hard Dees fan. A tear of sorrow and gratitude for Jimmy, memories of a hectic but precious time in our lives. And a breath-taking panorama of clouds. 

Getting my body back

The upside of having been ill or injured is how brilliant it feels once you start getting better. For four months now I have been unable to walk much, hampered by a torn cartilage in my right knee.

This has been good for my soul. I learnt to be patient. I learnt to distance myself from constant pain. I learnt that I am still me, even if my modus operandi has to change completely. I learnt a bit about acceptance – something I will need to develop increasingly as I head into old age.

Since an arthroscopy eight weeks ago, I am slowly but surely getting better. I am gradually able to up my walking by tiny increments. The surgeon tells me the inside of my knee is in poor shape; I’m likely to need a replacement in the next decade or so. But for now, we both hope that the clean up they did in there will keep me going for a few more years.

The euphoria of getting back on my feet has surprised me. Walking the streets, albeit slowly and with a clumsy hobble, has me feeling as high as a kite. Such a simple, basic pleasure; I want to grab every passer by who is on their feet and mobile and say, ‘Do you realise how lucky you are?’

Walking has long been one of my favourite things to do; now I am rediscovering its pleasures. How it makes me feel somehow one with the created order. How it is the perfect pace to notice things – birds, small animals, plants, a startling cloud formation. How everything in my body seems to shake down and find its rightful place when I go for a walk, how it helps me process everything that happens during the day. How it clears my head and banishes the small drifts of depression that still sometimes dog me.

I recall every time I have had gastro, and how wonderful it felt when I stopped vomiting. The bliss I feel when a migraine finally lifts. I remember how I felt each time I delivered a baby, and again when I weaned them - as though I had got my body back. (One of the rediscovered pleasures I indulged in the day after each child was born was lying on the uncomfortable hospital bed on my tummy, reading.)

Being able to walk again makes me feel not only that I have my body back, but that I have regained something of my equanimity. Being calm and cheerful most of the time is a lot less effort. The sense of profound well-being engendered by no longer being in pain is significant.

I am one of the fortunate ones who get better. Everywhere are people with chronic illness who will never recover their previous energy and fitness. Not to mention those injured in accidents who will never walk again, or worse.

And ultimately, no matter how well I look after myself, I will, if I’m lucky enough to last that long, become old. Death awaits us all in the end. I hope that the brushes I have had with illness and disability in the past year will prepare me to age a little more gracefully. And to make the most of being able while I am.

Yackandandah

Despite loving music, especially when it’s live, I’d never been to a music festival. We lived in Portland for years and I never made it down to Port Fairy on the March long weekend. It could be something to do with my aversion to crowds and to ‘scenes’. I love reading and writing too, but I haven’t been to the writers’ festival for over a decade. Or maybe I’m just lazy.

Then last weekend, which started with my 53^rd birthday, the entire Victorian branch of the family headed to Yackandandah Folk Festival. And had an absolute ball.

I hadn’t heard of any of the dozens of acts in the line up. Truth be told, the festival was mostly an excuse to spend an autumn weekend in the northeast – my favourite part of the state – where as a young couple we had four happy years and our first two babies. Now that the oldest of those babies has settled back in the area in an idyllic farmhouse outside Beechworth, the appeal is stronger than ever.

There were a bunch of their friends there too, and we had long cooked breakfasts on the verandah, endless cups of tea, a bonfire on the Saturday night and dips in their dam on Sunday morning which dawned crisp clear and sunny in a way that only the north-east can.

After the breakfasts, it was music all day long and far into the night if you felt like it. I saw thirteen acts, only two of which were dreadful. There were artists from all around the world. I saw a diminutive young Canadian woman who tap-danced while she played the fiddle. I chuckled at the a capella group Men in Suits singing an ode to Metro.

I heard exhilarating ‘apocalyptic folk rock’ that made it oh so hard not to ignore my dodgy knee and get up and dance. I heard young couples – several – whose voices and demeanours were so sweet I wanted to wrap them up and take them home. I went to hear Bluehouse – Australia’s answer to my favourite Indigo Girls – and laughed so hard I wanted to take those wild, rambunctious women to the pub for a few hours.

By dinnertime Saturday night I had had enough for one day and went home and to bed with my book and a cup of peppermint tea. After 12 hours sleep, I was ready to get up and do it all again. 

With all the rain, the northeast was looking its most glorious – green as Ireland. The stream through the town was running strong, burbling and clear and on its banks small groups of children tried their hand at busking. And of course it helps that Yack, which looks like the set for a gold rush film, is one of the sweetest towns in Victoria.

There were no big names at Yackandandah. It didn’t matter. In fact, it took away a lot of the stress, as we mooched around, just stopping off at whoever took our fancy. At coffee breaks we compared notes with the others in our party and made recommendations. 

On the first two days I listened and listened but didn’t buy a thing. On the Sunday the sun shone and I went nuts. We played our new CDs in the car on the way home and wondered why bands never sound as good when they’re not there in the flesh, just as photos are always a disappointment the first time you look at them, because inevitably you are comparing them with the real, live, technicolour thing itself – the landscape or the costume or the dear and laughing friend.

Then, after a while, you look at the photos again and realise that the colours aren’t so washed out and the perspective isn’t so inadequate and that they are worth more than their weight in gold for the memories they provoke.

In the same way, you listen to the CD and you realise what excited you about the music in the first place. It takes you back to a stuffy town hall clammy with unwashed campers bodies, or a street corner, to a chilly beer garden at the back of a pub, or a big draughty marquee, and the magic of live music, and it’s almost as good as being back there.

You pay a princely $70 for a ticket to the Yack Folk Festival. I wouldn’t be surprised to find some of our mob back there again next time. Including the birthday girl.

A big dog and a big scar - encounters on public transport

For all it can be uncomfortable, unreliable and occasionally downright scary, some days travelling on public transport is pure entertainment. 

It was the halt and the lame on the 5.30 tram to South Melbourne last Tuesday afternoon. A crowd of us scrambled on at the temporary tram stop at Little Collins, and the ‘disabled and elderly’ seats just inside the door were grabbed by me with my still dodgy and bandaged knee, and a much younger woman with an elaborate sling and an impressive, obviously fresh scar running from the top of her left shoulder to somewhere above her left breast.

It was hard not to look. She wore an asymmetrical white top that covered her good shoulder and left her war wound open to the fresh air and the covert glances of strangers.

Two stops along, a seriously old and fragile looking man got on, wobbly on his walking stick. I stood to give him my seat, whereupon he glanced irritably at me and said, ‘Why can’t the young girl give me hers?’

‘She’s injured,’ I point out, and he nods brusquely and maneuvers his way through the thick press of bodies by the door so he can squeeze into my vacant spot.

‘Oh but what about you?’ a kind young man sitting on the next seat along says. ‘You’re injured too,’ and insists on my taking his place. This isn’t as easy as it sounds, given that we are packed on so tight we’re all jammed hard up against each other, but we manage it eventually, without causing further trauma to either the frail old man or me.

We’re all nicely settled, when a bloke who has, up until this point been on a long, loud mobile phone conversation says to the shoulder girl, ‘Great scar!’

‘Thanks,’ she responds with an uncertain smile. 

‘I’m about to have an operation on my shoulder,’ he volunteers, ‘but I’m hoping they’ll be doing key hole surgery,’ and he launches into his medical history, asking the woman about details of hers. I wonder if I should rescue her by weighing in with tales of my own recent adventures under the knife, but I’m getting off. ‘Good luck with it,’ I settle on saying as I leave, and she flashes me a tired smile.

On the Upfield train next day, afternoon peak hour again, two young boys get on at Melbourne Central. They look about 11 and are raggedly dressed, with loads of tatts and complicated, scary-looking earrings. They have with them the kind of dog that makes me weak at the knees.

Several types of dog have this effect on me. Muscled, shorthaired, medium to large breeds are my favourite. Other women go mushy over a baby; for me it’s dogs.

‘Oh he’s magnificent,’ I breathe. ‘What is he? A pit bull cross? 

The kids’ eyes light up when they realize that I am not afraid of their animal, on the contrary, I’m smitten.

‘Boxer cross,’ says the fair-haired one proudly, his face suddenly wreathed in smiles, and we proceed to have the kind of conversation that dog-lovers all over the world have as the handsome creature responds to my caresses with licks. I tell them about dogs I have loved, including our pit bull-Staffy cross, and they tell me about their pet’s little idiosyncrasies. ‘He’s got a really small head; the vet reckons that’s why he’s so dumb,’ the boy chuckles fondly.

‘So many people are scared of him,’ says the darker kid, and I suppose that’s not surprising given all the recent bad publicity these big, tough looking dogs have received. But I look at him, all thumping tail and soft, besotted eyes looking into mine and all I see is a big teddy bear.

‘You look after him now,’ I say as I get off at Brunswick, and limp home, pondering that although I miss my long walks to work and back more than I can say, travelling on public transport does have its compensations.