Archive for the 'Queen Me' Category

Flashing Around

Published on August 31, 2010 in Cranky/Dopey Bitch, Married Life and Queen Me. 11 Comments

Second love heart-break came in the middle of spring and at the end of my university career. It was confusing being lovelorn when the smell of jasmine wafted from the bottom of the garden on the damp, creek air. It was muddled to be devastated when the jacarandas in the hills brought all the silver eucalypti to contrasted life.

It was hard work being that mopey but I gave it a really good shot. And he helped me along by finding another girlfriend within the space of two weeks. And when I mean finding I mean, she was already waiting in the wings for her turn on stage, although I am sure that she got to play understudy a couple of times.

I had a degree that everyone jokingly said came with the words ‘Do you want fries with that?’ and I had no job. Every day I walked the River Road, where I would buy the newspaper to look for gainful employment. The walk was always balmy and breezy, no matter the time of day but walking along leaves too much room for thoughts. And introspective Piscean Literature/Creative writing graduates have an overabundance of those, especially in times of abject grief. It was beautiful and warm outside but I was cold and bleak inside, as only a 20 year-old who still lived at home with her parents could be.

I often played a game on those walks, when I wasn’t cowering from swooping magpies. I would flash myself forward 6 months and imagine the same walk. What would I be wearing? Would I have a job, a new boyfriend? I never thought to think I might not be taking the same walk, but it was my fantasy.

As I grew older sometimes I still played the game but in reverse. Pretend I was me 10 years ago, flash forwarded into this car. Would I be shocked, surprised, disappointed to see the small, dusty interior of a moderately priced car? Ooh – look! I am married! Are those my thighs? The hair isn’t bad but I am not sure about the lines around the eyes. Hey at least I have learnt how to use eye-liner. Is this what passes for music these days?

My flash forwards get smaller and chronologically correct in scope again as I wait for the next thing that an old me in a future scenario would expect. A bigger car, tired eyes and something very precious in the back seat.

40 Hours of No Internet……

Published on August 23, 2010 in Beloved, Cranky/Dopey Bitch, Pop Culture and Queen Me. 16 Comments

Here in Australia we have a fund-raising even called the 40 Hour Famine. Traditionally you give up food for 40 hours and people sponsor you. But the beast has evolved and you can choose to give up anything. Some give up furniture or transport or technology or even shoes. I decided to give up the internet. A bit piss-weak I know, but I was gonna make the money whether I starved myself or not, which would have been very ugly for husband. So that is what I did this weekend. Of course my lil facebook addicted brain couldn’t let go of its status update habit.

If I was near the net, it might have gone something like:

  • Deep breaths, I can do this.
  • Wow! I have so much more time to get ready this morning!
  • Do you think I could make money out of a dog corral at polling places at election time?
  • I can’t believe how nervous I am just to go on a stupid course. ‘Writing for Young Adults’ at UWA with Deb Fitzpatrick, AJ Betts and Cate Sutherland.
  • Fuck I despise nodders. The chick in front of me looks like a bobble-head dog. One or two timely nods of agreement will suffice lady.

….this all took me till about lunch time on Saturday. And then I gave up, just enjoying lunch at the Left Bank with Nursey Chick then a lovely election dinner of Little Caesar’s pizza with MoFoKA and family. The company was sterling and Little Caesar’s is actually the best pizza in the world. Like they won an award for it. You haven’t lived till you have had the Greek Lamb pizza or the Eskimo Joe dessert pizza. (See why I couldn’t give up food for 40 hours?)

I know how much time I fart-arse around on the net and it really has to stop. Perhaps I need a 40 hour famine every weekend?

ps: Go listen to the latest song ‘Love’s the Reason’ by Jasmine. Tis awesome. Just like her.

An Easy 16 Bucks

Published on August 17, 2010 in Nostalgia and Queen Me. 6 Comments

If I reach back into my memory and put the pieces together, the dinner was for Mrs Mouse’s birthday. She was named so because my father nicknamed all my friends for the woodland creatures they resembled. We all met at the restaurant in the hills and sat on the deck, overlooking the twinkling valley. All but four of us were coupled up and I felt especially sad, as Beloved and I had recently uncoupled. Even so, the company was nice and there was wine to be had. And as we all know, where there is wine there is whizz.

‘Does anyone else need to go to the loo?’ I asked, glancing at the back of the restaurant, past a large group of late-teen boys, towards the facilities. Sis caught my glance. Now she is not one to be adverse to a paired wee-ing but she was feeling mischievous this particular evening.

‘I dare you to go alone!’

‘What?’ I scoffed ‘Course I can bloody go alone.’

‘Really?’ she asked, looking pointedly at the noisy boys. ‘I want  to watch you, go to the loo, by yourself, past those guys. I wanna see if they have a perve.’

‘Aw man, do I have to?’

‘I’ll pay you’ she says, putting two dollars on the table.

‘I bet those guys are at their end of year footy dinner too!’ say Porcupine, reaching for her purse.

By then the rest of our table had got wind of this odd pseudo dare/bet and started forking out the coinage. By the time that there was nearly $20 on the table there was a lot of pressure, so to speak, on me going to the ladies.

‘Fine!’ I huffed, patting down my 2001 outfit of a knee-length pencil skirt, red top with ruffled sleeves and black wedge heels. Face crimson and eyes resolutely ahead I steamed towards those dunnies. I didn’t spare a backwards glance to the cat-calling smart-arses who called themselves my friends, nor did I cast a sideways look at the rowdy table gone suspiciously silent.

When I returned, refreshed and  released, Sis was beside herself with merriment.

‘You should have seen them all stop and stare! So funny!’

Only funny if I was really worth staring at, even to a bunch of barely pubescent boys allowed to have an under-age beer or two. I am just glad I could prostitute myself for their tipsy amusement .

100 Word Post: Your Friends, My Fault

Published on August 9, 2010 in 100 Word Posts, Cranky/Dopey Bitch and Queen Me. 8 Comments

You freely admit that once you found it hard to make friends. The closest to your heart were flung far around the country, so when fledgling friendships took flight I was inordinately proud. You surrounded yourself with the articulate, nerdy-cool, successful, and popular.

Five years on they shun you and it is because of me. I never thought to burn with shame could be a real thing. But it is. It prickles, effervescent and red.

I want to yell ‘Fuck them!’ but how dare I, when I am cocooned in true mateship, so soft, safe and close ?

I’m sorry.

Sisters – A Memory to Keep

Published on July 11, 2010 in Babies, Nostalgia and Queen Me. 28 Comments

In the big wooden bed they lie, curled like a closing quotation mark. The room is mauve and lilac. Pushing past the tropical foliage the light through the window is insistent.

One of them makes an unladylike noise and the other rolls over, eyebrows raised. The offender opens an eye and giggles. They both do.

They could be 10 and 11. The quiet, the comfort, the naughtiness, the illicit mirth induced snorts feel like it, but they aren’t. At 31 and 32 they have just eaten steak sandwiches on the front lawn, on plastic backed blankets; champagne bubbles tasting of a Karratha Winter (which is anyone’s Summer) tickling their nostalgia and beckoning for nap-time.

Thousands of miles away from the memory’s home, the Little One asks the Big One if she remembers them sharing the bed that came to stay just before Gran from England did. The Big One doesn’t at all and the Little One reminds her what a terrible memory she has. The Big One is always indignant. She has a very good memory thank you very much. It is funny how shared histories merge and diverge.

They say that if they were their mother, at the age they are now, they would have a Big One of 6 and  Little One of 5. They can’t imagine how she survived it, no matter how long-haired, blonde and sunny, brunette and shy,  yet altogether endearing they were.

Without wanting to wish away their younger selves or their future babies, they marvel at, and are grateful for the years they have had with each other, alone. The Big One wonders if, however, they are being punished for waiting; the time, the money, the career. Is this why it is taking so long for their own families to arrive?

But whatever happens, the Big One loves the Little One and the Little One loves the Big One and they cherish their time, just as sisters, visiting in this red-earthed town.

On a Cheery Note, I’m off to Karratha!

Published on July 6, 2010 in Babies, Beloved, Married Life, Nostalgia and Queen Me. 9 Comments

There is nothing like an impending flight to make you assess your life up until said trip in a flimsy metal contraption that is very, very high up in the sky. 

It is not that I am scared of flying. It is more  a fear of death/not being around. I am so freaking nosey – all the things I will miss out on if I am not here! Of course I would want my husband to move on. But not too soon. And she will not allowed to be hotter or smarter than me.

But as I mentioned above it causes me to look back on my 32 years. I have and have had a really nice life. My family is generally whole, my childhood was sunlight and dust mote filled, my love life wasn’t rent with any particular betrayals or scandals, I went to university, I traveled Europe after my beautiful wedding, my friends give me joy and fulfilment. I have written a book, that if anyone so desired, only (hopefully) needs a bit of tweaking before possible publication, if not for the fact it is any good, but for nostalgia’s sake.

If it was my turn to go, the only thing I would be sad about would be not having insects with my Beloved husband.

I don’t think that being in a plane crash would be an ideal way to meet my maker, but shit it’d be a story told in the family for generations. I have also heard that if compensation is sought by the relatives, they often get quite a lot because of the psychological trauma the deceased would have suffered knowing they were going down. That might just be in America though. 

Anyway. If I am meant to go ‘young’ , if it is not in a blaze of glory, this way it will at least be in a blaze of some sort.

Grumpy Young Pussy; ‘Received’ Loud and Clear

Published on July 1, 2010 in Beloved, Cranky/Dopey Bitch and Queen Me. 23 Comments

‘Why do you want those mean fuckers to give you a review?’ Beloved asked.

 ‘I dunno, feedback?’ I replied feebly. ‘And I have to practise getting slammed if I want to be a writer.’

 But of course it was more than feedback. I wanted validation, acceptance and a little more traffic. I knew that when the review happened I would probably cry like I was at my first day of primary school, not knowing where to put the tissue box we had to bring – scared, confused and out of my comfort zone.

I imagined that I would be told that my template is a terrible colour (regardless that I love it), I am shallow, anal-retentive, flippant, insecure, arrogant and take my husband and nice lifestyle for granted, have whiny-ass body issues and have no idea what the ‘real’ world is like. Well…at least that is what I think on a down day.

However, there was one thing that I wouldn’t be able to abide. MoFoKA, who reminded me of the delicious, nasty, hilarious, train-wreck viewing website back in January, and I were discussing when my review might happen after 5 months of waiting, and what the harsh, cold light of reality would have to say about Grumpy.

‘I don’t care what they say,’ I said with more than a quiver in my soul ‘just as long as they don’t tell me I can’t write. I would die if they said that.’

Did they say that?  Opening my comment box at 5am, to find that curt message awaiting me – my breath caught and my legs jolted with adrenaline. Were all my dreams still intact?

 Go and have a look for yourself.

The Pits

Published on June 30, 2010 in Over-sharers Anonymous, Queen Me and Teaching. 14 Comments

Do you know how hard it is to write on a whiteboard when you don’t want to lift your arms above chest height? As a teacher it is an integral part of my day.

It has been 7 years since I have been free of a problem that has plagued me my whole ‘adult’ (hormone-wise) life. It is not a huge deal in the whole scheme of horrible-things-that-happen, but it impinged on every aspect of my life, making me feel self-conscious, all day, every day.

I am a sweater.  I don’t mean that I am a jumper, pull-over or jersey. And like an alcoholic, just because I am not doing it, it doesn’t mean I am not one.

Back in the day I could sweat through a t-shirt, woollen jumper AND a denim jacket. I wasn’t hot (obviously considering the layers of clothes) and I wasn’t particularly nervous. But either way I had got myself into some sort of psychosomatic loop that would cause copious moisture in the armpit region. To put it bluntly, it was retarded. If I was home alone, I could wear a skin tight shirt and not sweat a drop but once I was out of that house it was on.

It affected the clothes I bought, they way I moved, and of course the way I smelled.

I went to the doctor. Botox was suggested. But on a starting teacher’s wage it wasn’t doable. Although now, with the possibilities of what I could do with the left-overs, it would be great! They also told me I could get the nerve clipped. Also not appealing.

And then Driclor became my friend. It is a special $20 ‘deoderant’ that you apply last thing at night when you are least active (NOT, I repeat, not after a hot shower) for three nights in a row. Until you wash it off the next morning, it will be burny and itchy and make your legs twitch uncontrollably at times but you will not sweat a drop for at least 2 weeks. However for me, the resulting blocked ducts were incredibly painful and made shaving difficult. The freedom of dry underarms was short lived as I couldn’t handle the pain.

Luckily I am nothing but tenacious and tried it again a couple of months later, and this time Driclor and I have been getting along famously for the last 6 or so years. I can apply it for one night in every 4-6 weeks, no sweat, and minimal duct blockage. I would say the only issue is that if I do feel the need for the psychosomatic sweat, it appears on my upper lip or lower back. Not often though.

People ask me if I am worried about any possible side effects, such as cancer and I say no. The freedom that this product has afforded me, in terms of giving me my confidence back  has been invaluable. It may sound melodramatic but sweating ruled my life.

Now I can write at the top of the whiteboard, point at things, leisurely rock back in a chair with my arms behind my head in a repose of comfort and ease, I can wear tops that gently hug my pits and if I am feeling really non-OCD I can wear the same shirt – TWICE, in a ROW!

The only sweating I do now is the hard earned kind.

The Scent of Adhesive on a Dressing….

Published on June 27, 2010 in Beloved, Nostalgia and Queen Me. 12 Comments

….for Beloved’s hernia surgery wound took me straight back to being no more than 4 years old, wearing an eye-patch for a lazy eye. However, the patch and glasses weren’t working so surgery it was. I imagine I was about 6 years old but I remember it like it was yesterday.

My parents dropped me off the night before the operation, staying quite late. I know they were far more worried about it than I was. And now that I am the age my mum was when it happened, albeit childless, I feel the fear too. I remember exactly where the bed was, I remember lying there in the gloom of the evening, after they had left, playing with the gift they gave me – a plastic tablet that you drew on and when you lifted the thin film of plastic the drawing would be erased. The plastic was pink and the drawings were neon orange. I drew my family, with the house and car and budgie called Drackie. I was comfortable and very much awake. The nurse had to come in and gently encourage me to go to sleep.

The next morning mum was back. I was given various medications to get me all doped up. Tablets? Nope, wide awake. Needle in the butt-cheek? Still perky. I got all the way into the operating theatre, mum by my side to the very last set of swinging doors. They laid me onto a padded rubber mat with 6 round indentation filled with a gooey gel. I am not sure how real or accurate that was, but it is what I recall. I was with them until I counted down from 10 with the big black mask over my face.

The anaesthetic didn’t agree with me when I woke up – I spent a lot of  time throwing up into a kidney shaped dish. And the pain. You know how when you are getting the flu and it hurts to move your eyes? Times that by about 100. The only problem with that was that my parents had brought me another gift. A sparkly red tutu, that they had placed behind my bed. It doesn’t matter how sore a little girl’s eyes are, there is no force on earth that can stop her craning her head to get a peek at a tutu.

I am not sure how long I was in the hospital, but I had lots of visitors. When mum and dad came to pick me up, I was happily engaged in a burping competition with a boy in the bed diagonally opposite. I think his name was Daniel. Or Brad.

I don’t have many memories as clear as this one, except maybe my first day at school, or the time I had to have surgery on my other eye, perhaps not much than a year later.

No, There Were No Anal Probes

Published on June 20, 2010 in Depression and Queen Me. 10 Comments

The house I found myself in was an amalgamation of the house I live in now, and the house I grew up in; the house my father built. Every light was on and the back door was wide open to the darker side of dusk. I walked out onto the dampening  lawn and saw that two parallel gouges had been dug into the grass in a meandering pattern.

I walked back into the blazing light – I didn’t know who I was. I looked at myself and saw 2 razor thin cuts on each arm. They bled weakly, stinging against the whiteness of my skin.

Looking up from my damaged body I saw a lady – my mother! I knew who I was again! She was dressed head to toe  like a cat burglar, her blonde hair in stark contrast to the black hooded jumper.

I flew into her arms, crying: ‘You weren’t lying! It happened to you too, didn’t it? You know it is true!” She said it was and patted my hair. She didn’t judge me, even though I – we - had been abducted by aliens.

Waking from this dream I felt unsettled. I mentioned it on facebook and people joked ‘Was it really a dream?’ When I showered that morning, I looked for a deeper meaning and I found the blueness that sometimes hovers around, dipping and teasing.

Perhaps I need to show more understanding to those who suffer – it doesn’t mean it isn’t real, just because I don’t feel what they feel.

Maybe one day it will come to get me, take me from my bed and do things I can’t imagine.