want you to see

Last night marked a milestone in a young girl's life.

It was not a milestone in the same way that a first day at school, a first kiss, the arrival or departure of a loved one, a publicly celebrated achievement, et cetera, might be looked back upon as milestones. The precise contours of the night are - as are those of many a fun time before and since - at risk of becoming misplaced in the girl's ever expanding, not infrequently overwhelmed, memory palace (to borrow a catchphrase of Hannibal Lecter's). Indeed one could get away with regarding the night as unexceptional - albeit only in the sense that Hilary Swank winning her next Academy Award, or Bill Gates making/losing his next gazillion dollars before breakfast, could be casually dismissed by some as unexceptional.

Thus it must be against all odds, for any length-of-time to rise above all the other no less entertaining and no more forgettable lengths-of-time, for it to thereby shun the fate of oblivion. What stacked the odds in last night's favour, was its marking the beginning of a special something. Something rich yet intangible, a lifelong love affair perhaps - as bad blurb writers say.

Last night, between the hours of twenty thirty and twenty-two hundred in particular, the girl in question was
- aged eight years and four months;
--- wearing a white tee with three little blue flowers front centre,
--- a knee-length denim skirt her mother had helped her pick out the weekend before,
--- no shoes;
----- standing (far from still) some fifty metres inland of the Indian Ocean,
----- between zero and sixty centremetres, dictated by rhythm, next to her nearest fellow human being;
----- not more than ten metres in front of a polytechnic stage flanked by speakers twice her height.

The girl was having her very first, live and up-close with a popstar, experience.

Should her mind ever be directed to revisiting this experience, it will not inform her of the popstar's mainstream status and his consequential lack of credibility in the eyes of the artsy / intellectual / left. It will not reliably retrieve the composition of the audience, the condition of the venue, or the identities of the people who had brought her along. She may well recall something of her big sister's friend/suspected bf's extreme enjoyment of every movement and sound made by the man on stage, but will not dwell long upon why.

What she will remember, however, will do her good. Lights that put highlighter outlines around everyone on stage. A handsome man singing and eliciting inexplicable screams to which, before long, she was contributing. A sea of waving hands, some holding cameras. Clear-plastic rainbow-coloured beach balls dancing above and across the crowd. The way her feet felt against the moist lawn, her hair in the air, her and her sister's arms entwined, as they each marvelled at, and succumbed to, the power of (even so-so) music. ...

And if she doesn't remember all, or most, of this, I hope she will at least retain that feeling - like eating icecream, for the first time, with jelly and cheesecake.

3.2

'twill be day 18 at Work tomorrow. I feel like jotting something down about these times, before I start to lose track of the years let alone the days I'll have been here.

Looking out from our 40th-floor office, whichever way you turn is a stunning wide-angle calendar/postcard shot. You haven't really seen the Swan River and surrounds until you've been to our building. Even the view from my desk (which, thankfully, is not inside a cubicle or, worse, a room the size of an archive box), of the city and Northbridge, in which everything seems nearer, flattened, cramped, indistinct - even that is endearing in a way that every Perthan would appreciate.

I have a secretary. <= There's a statement I hadn't expected to make so early in my journey to the Dark Side. She's years younger than me, and way more competent - a relief and a blessing for all, is all I have to say. I don't have her all to myself, but whenever I've needed her help she's managed to attend to it immediately. I've seen her stand up for herself to a lawyer when given more to do than time to do it in, but she hasn't given me any attitude (yet) for being the know-nothing new kid. And she's the prettiest secretary around.

Speaking of pretty young girls, our junior support staff are all such. Their job is to lodge and serve documents (hence the emphasis on appearance, I suspect), food-shop, update looseleaf reference materials, help with photocopying/binding/shredding etc., come 'round to collect people's mugs and cutlery towards the end of the day, ... I simplify though by no means trivialise. No idea how Bossman sources his ladies (ostensibly not through the same channels whence I came), they're all fresh-out-of-Yr-12, pleasant-looking, softly-spoken, mild-mannered, individuals. Some are hoping to work their way up, others hanging around while they figure out what they really want to do with their lives. They don't interact much with the professional staff except when they're being assigned, or reporting back on, errands; but they don't seem to mind having me around (the clerks, be they junior or Articled, share the same workspace).

It's true: an insane amount of tree-hurting goes on in a law firm. As the most junior member of staff qualified to charge for "legal work" in 6-minute units, I get to cause much of the hurt first-hand. Our copiers could do with trays that'll take recycled (one-sided) paper without fear of jams.

Did I see it coming? I certainly should have; after all lawyers are practised in deception, if nothing else. They let me have a cruisy first couple of weeks - in hindsight that must've taken considerable self-restraint on their part - after which they wasted no more time in allocating me all sorts of menial unlawyerly-yet-chargeable tasks. I can't remember the last time I was called upon to ponder the fundamentals of justice and equality; was long before I started here. And perhaps I ought to be not just a little embarassed to say, I'm not all that fussed. Over and above the fact of its being something-to-be-gotten-through, I intend to enjoy the lack of responsibility while I can, and defer the stress/fatigue/insomnia for as long as possible. All in good time anyway.

In the beginning, as is the case in all my beginnings, maybe even before the beginning, I - I won't say "worried"... wondered, rather - whether I would get along with my would-be colleagues. My previous workplaces have each in their own way been unconventional, in the sense of requiring minimal schmoozing (bar one), such that in the first few days at least, on more than one occasion, I came close to questioning my "credentials" in this unchartered territory. Then I remembered, of course, that people warm slowly (but surely?) to me, or I to them, or both. I may not be equipped or inclined to join in every (or any) sporting debate / critique of opposing counsel / conversation inspired by a former child star's biceps / lamentation about bra ergonomics (or lack thereof) / ...; but there will no doubt be times when I am.

catch her in the Rice

No one who is at all familiar with my ever-evolving-never-slackening budget constraints (imaginary or not, self-inflicted or not) would be surprised, I suppose, to learn that I had never experienced a live performance by anyone remotely "famous". Never, that is, until last Thursday night.

If the chosen destination of my maiden voyeurage does not readily commend (or even reveal) itself to you, perhaps we have less in common than originaly suspected. Which would obviously be your loss, not mine or Damien's. I mean, he is Irish, hangs out with Tori, writes about older chests and accidental babies (neither of which I'm crazy about, btw, fyi), shows up more than once on the TLW soundtrack... What more could a girl ask for? Oh I know what. An agonisingly beautiful female co-vocalist. Which, of course, he delivers also.

So what if my increasingly middle-class friends don't care for him an awful lot, or if the artsy ones can't take him seriously enough. Listening to him and Lisa makes it that much easier for me to visualise trekking across volcanos, licking coconut skins, meeting Eskimos, and learning to play the Tibetan singing bowl - all of which I hope to do one day.

three little pigs

Welcome to another year of Me and all Piglets out there!

Of the few remaining ways in which I can be said to be Chinese, my fervour for CNY and the inexplicable rituals it entails is one. It is a time I've never wanted to spend away from family; the handful of times when I had to, were categorically unenjoyed.

Today I drove for hours, all over town, in the rain, to gather ingredients for our feast tonight. In between there was Charlie & the Chocolate Factory with N while next door mum worked her kitchen magic that filled a house with the music of Home. After dinner we collapsed across our palatial-yet-unergonomic lounge suite and watched some people sing no-expense-spared praise to the Motherland, some others pontificate the meanings of CNY, and others still poke occasionally-successful-and-always-PC fun at things which the Administration deems appropriate to poke fun at. Doesn't sound like the best possible night in? It is actually one of those debilitating habits out of which I've been neither able nor willing to break.

Of course it's not just about the food. Nobody I know has had to wait 'til NYE to have any particular food - at least not since 1979. It isn't about the company either: the four of us eat together often enough. And with each passing year I am in direct contact with the rellies in China a little less - more out of 'distance' than disinterest. So really, I forget the bases upon which I nostalgiate, yet again.

It is said that each year corresponding to one's horoscope holds trials and revelations unrivalled by any seen in the other years. I'm not inclined to argue with conventional wisdom nor with cold hard facts. The first little piggy brought me into this world. The second little piggy brought me to this continent. The third little piggy will hopefully bring me to into a nice suburb, or the arms of a beautiful person, or both. If I promise to be a good little piggy and avoid making major decisions all year, in accordance with witch-doctors' advice, surely that isn't too much to ask?

Didn't get around to buying bright red undies for the festivities (as any respectable oinker would've done), but I did remember yesterday morning to put on the only clean red ones I could find. Never hurts to err on the safe side!

edges of reason

What do you really know? And in any particular case, in my case, what do you really want to know? I'm afraid it won't make sense to you. I really mean that. I am genuinely afraid it won't make sense. I am not trying to sound casual or smug.
Listen - all that she was then, all that she is now, those gestures, everything I remember but won't or can't articulate anymore, the perfect words that are somehow made imperfect when used to describe her and all that should remain unsaid about her - it is all unsupported by reason. I know that. But that enigmatic calm that attaches itself to people in the presence of reason - it's something from which I haven't been able to take comfort, not reliably, not since her.
It's like the smell of burnt toast. You made the toast. You looked forward to it. You even enjoyed making it, but it burned. What were you doing? Was it your fault? It doesn't matter anymore. You open the window but only the very top layer of the smell goes away. The rest remains around you. It's on the walls. You leave the room but it's on your clothes. You change your clothes but it's in your hair. It's on the thin skin on the tops of your hands. And in the morning, it's still there.

Simon, on Anna, in Seven Types of Ambiguity

Because I overslept, missed my lift, then couldn't be arsed driving solo to Roleystone. Because the person whose home-coming I would pike on was more a friend-of-a-friend than a friend, even if we did go to the same high school for two years. Because having set out to catch up on the week's shut-eye this afternoon, I instead spent the better part of it dreaming about the last person I should be dreaming about at this point in February and arguably, at all. Because thereafter I had to get away from me, to occupy my mind with concepts that were unlikely to find their way back to its usual troubled inhabitants. -- I offered to show Eleven, the Taiwanese tourist who'd asked me for street directions some weeks ago, a bit more of Perth. Her Korean roommate came too, which happily halved my already-slim chances of talking about myself.

Because my sense of misdirection continues to perfect itself, so as to raise transit time to at least double that of your Average Sunday Driver. Because the girls liked the beach more than they thought they would, and lingered. Because they were happy bar-hopping instead of sticking with one place and in all likelihood becoming bored/disheartened sooner. Because alfresco people-watching from any James St eatery is relaxing and therapeutic. Even counting the extra care taken to enunciate, it was a breeze passing those 4 hours. Just the innocuousness I needed, though I suspect not nearly enough thereof, to carry me through what looks to be another restless week.

The particular James St eatery randomly selected by me this evening was value-packed; for me anyway. Our waitress mesmerised me, not least because she channeled Isabella Rossellini circa Alias - and was hotter, if that's possible. I offered, and the owner/manager lady enthusiastically accepted, a Proper Hug - because it'd been a rough day, because Isabella did, because I could. And because of all that, but not only - I never had better mocha.