Stop racing towards something that doesn't exist!

The one true thing I know about work is that it will never be done.  There is always more to do.  We race to Friday, the holidays, the year end as though it is some sort of finishing line.  That once the line is reached the work will be done and our lives will become magically freer, simpler, happier.  How silly of us to have such a notion!

We have discovered perpetual motion.  It is the way in which we live our lives!  Such an ingrained notion of society is very unlikely to change.  Ever!  A revolution is required, a protest, a gathering...

This is unlikely to happen.  We are too concerned with the finish line to be bothered with the greater good...

I need to do something about this but I don't know how.  I'm trapped in my employment contract, my mortgage, my commitments.  Even if I rid myself of all these things, then what is left.  Firstly I need to survive, find food and shelter and then I can imagine a new way of thinking.

I'll keep updating this post as ideas come to mind.  Let me know your ideas too.

The Path - a draft of a waking dream

The path is dark again
The trees so dense
That moonlight cannot penetrate
Nor the stars

On the dark path
I am the black panther
Stalking my prey
Longing to devour

I pounce and tear the flesh
Devouring and disemboweling
Warm blood absorbed
Into my black coat

There is no light
The trees are dense
A perfect place for me
To stalk my prey

Night after night
I slink through the jungle
I find the flesh

No light can touch me
The trees are so dense
The path is dark again

When I grow up...

What do you want to be when you grow up?

We aren't likely to realise it at the time but that is one helluva loaded question. When I was first asked that question, I believe my four year old self said, "a dancer." I was never flexible enough and my flat feet were two left feet. I don't think I meant it at the time. It was the first thing that popped into my head that I felt was appropriate for a little girl to say.

I really wanted to be Supergirl. It was the first film I saw at the cinema and I aspired to flight, super hearing and x-ray/heat vision. Not to mention a spectacular mane of blonde hair and wicked red boots (just like my Barbie doll).

The closest I got to this, I worked five years at Red Rooster.

I would eventually answer that age old question with suitably feminine occupations (not in my opinion nowadays) nurse or teacher.

Why not doctor, lawyer or astrophysicist?  WHY?

Actually I did toy with astrophysics when I was 14 but gave up the idea for paediatrics. I think the astrophysics idea was a quiet protest against the fascination with marine biology being tossed around by my classmates (all female) but it was probably also to do with my fascination with space, astronauts, superheroes and sci-fi. I'll watch anything sci-fi, except Event Horizon.  I made it nearly halfway through the film before my ocular phobia kicked in. You try watching that rubbish when one of your recurring childhood nightmares is about your eyes falling out and smashing into little shards of coloured glass. It's impossible.

So is watching the Exorcist when you've been brought up Catholic. Like scary Irish Catholic-Catholic. I'm over that now but I still won't watch the Exorcist.

So apart from saving the world and sick babies I decided at 15 that Veterinarian Science would be the degree for me. I went to open days, did my work experience in a vet clinic, assisted in surgery and euthanasia. The allergies were a pain but I'll still suffer itchy eyes and runny noses for fluffy cuddly kitties. Somewhere along the way I gave up that idea too. I felt I would find it hard to pick up a scalpel and cut into living flesh, even if it is for the good of the patient.

It also probably had something to do with music.  I played bass, bass clarinet and I was good, damn good.

I miss holding this instrument so much it physically pains me...

There was some unpleasantness and so I gave it up, horrified at what was going on 'behind the scenes' so to speak.

At 22 I gave away my place and set about choosing a path.  I did not choose wisely.  The HR degree did not get me a job in HR anywhere.  So rather than go back to uni and do what I really wanted to do, I settled for a switch bitch job in superannuation.  WHY?  I did it because I thought that at the ripe old age of 24 it was time to work and not study...

Oh Jax, you are a fool

Five years later I was made redundant, a week after breaking up with the boyfriend I was ridiculously in love with.  As fun as that was it was also the perfect catalyst to looking at myself and my desires.  I was about to hit the reset button.  I looked back at my uni preferences, far down the list I had submitted an application to study Chinese medicine at RMIT, after that, Naturopathy.  I've always wanted to be of use for the good of society, not the bad.

Now, four years later, I'm halfway through my degree and loitering at another crossroad. You see, there are only two subjects left I can study online. After them I must attend classes.  Problem is, I work office hours Monday to Friday with no hope of flexible hours. Damn. What do I do now?

I'm 33 years old and I'm still stuck.  What do I do next? I hate this corporate world I've lived in for the past 10 years but I'm trapped within the confines of a mortgage. Logically, it's better to have the property but if I'm not happy with my lot in life, is financial security really worth it?

One thought, might switch to the Advance Dip of Naturopathy and finish the degree later. Another, hope this writing for a community paper/website ends up somewhere. My favourite thought; re-writing Germaine Greer's 'The Female Eunuch' for the next generation, because if the devil's greatest trick is convincing people he doesn't exist, then mans greatest trick is convincing the women of the world they are equal with men.

I will not go gently into this good night.

My First Memory

What I'm about to share with you is something I have never ever ever told any one in the whole wide world ever. I'm being over-expressive because this is a really difficult experience to describe and the thought of it brings back all those feelings of dread and anguish. This is my first memory, the earliest thing I can remember and quite possibly the worst thing that has ever happened to me. Ever. 

I was somewhere between 2 and 3 years old, it was before my brother was born so it was just me and mum at home during the day. 

I was in the lounge room when I heard the rumbling rolling. The sound caught my heartbeat and sent it flying, faster and faster. The moaning started next, muffled cries of pain heralding what was coming. I could feel the vibrations through the floor and I slowly rode them to the corridor. From the bedroom, at the front of the house, a new image superimposed itself on the sunlight shining through the window and illuminating the green grass of the garden. What was it? Was it coming for me?

It was them, coming for me. 

It was a great wheel of metal and flesh. Naked, dirty bodies of men and women. I'd never seen anything like this before. They were tied to a giant wheel. The wheel of death. They were on a mission, sent by Hell or by Death, I don't know. I tore back to the lounge and threw myself into my father's chair. I curled up beneath the cushion of the seat and closed my eyes tight. I listened to the sound, the rumble ripped through the house and rolled through the glass doors, out into the backyard and away. 

I don't know why they came and went, or who for. Whatever it is has been with me ever since. In dreams that shaped me. Suffocated and defiant, yet scared and alone. Who could ever understand the fear of seeing Hell in the flesh at less than three years of age. 

I will always hope for the best but I will always fear you too. 

Resonating pain

Pain resonating.
Resonating pain.

Different day, same shit.
Back to front.
In reverse.
Finding myself again.
At the pub.
Three drinks in.
Winning?
Nup, surely not.

I can't hear anything above the sound resonating from my sacrum.
The pain's tonality and timbre hold my skull in a vice-like grip.
The clamp winds itself tighter with every pounding beat of my heart.
In rhythm, save me, kill me.
Back and forth the melody weaves it's way like a serpent through the forest of synapses and flow of electrical currents.

Resonating pain.
Pain resonating.

Religion - Poem written September 2009

Have you looked at us 
From the outside? 
Have you seen it? 
The singing, the praying, the droning? 
Do you realise 
We are drones? 
Do you appreciate the blood, the body? 
Have you ever shed a tear for Him? 
Look! Hanging there! Pain! 
What do you think of the cannibalism? 
Or do you not? Because it is just wafer and wine? 
Feel the words? Do you know what you’re saying? 
Tell me! Recite the Apostles Creed, on your own, without the drones? 
You can’t do it, but He still loves you. 
Apparently, so they say. 
But I’ll love you, anyway, just the same, just as you are. 
Human.

What is the Opposite of a God complex - Poem written December 2009

Is it a Mother Nature complex?

I don't want the power
I don't want the fame
I don't want you to know me

I want to know you
without knowing you
Nurture you
Love you

But I don't want to belong to you
I don't want you to know you have
My unconditional love

It can't be seen anyway
It lives within a hard shell

I want you to grow 
and learn 
and live without me

It's mine to give and I'll give as I choose
Yeah it's some sort of complex...