The Carriage Held But Just Ourselves

I've started a new blog over the road at wordpress (blogger is great, I just thought I'd try something different). It's a bit more personal than Marrickvillia... so please come to visit at http://thecarriageheldbutjustourselves.wordpress.com/, I'd love to see you. Marrickvillia is almost an old lady now in blog-years: she is out to pasture but I will visit her often -- in fact, there is a review of a new book set in Marrickville on my stovetop as I type...

If anyone would like to write something for Marrickvillia please feel free: reviews, commentary, politics, festivals, found objects, crime, culture, transport, food -- anything -- so long as it's about Marrickville, obviously.

See you around the layers of webbiness...

mj

Small acts of kindness

Muriel lived next door with her son, Peter, and his various grown children and their spouses who came and went. English wasn’t Muriel’s first language, although she’d never left Australia; she was an Aboriginal woman. At least once a week she’d come home late, a little bit drunk, her keys lost, and cry outside Jenny’s front door “Jenny, Jenny, you there love! Jenny?”

Jenny was always kind to Muriel, bringing her cups of tea while she waited for Peter to either get home or wake up from his heavy drunken sleep. His bedroom was the front one, so only a pane of glass separated him from Muriel’s cries of “Petey, Petey, open the door, it’s Nan, it’s ya mum, you gotta gimme a new key, Petey!” Muriel never swore, and she didn’t seem to feel sorry for herself although she was poor and disabled. Another one of her sons had bashed her a few years ago and left her with a permanently injured back, so now she needed a walking frame to get about. She lived on the pension and was regularly kicked out of pubs; taxis often wouldn’t stop for her. She thought this was because they were all driven by Chinks, who weren’t to be trusted, but then her doctor up at the bulk billing place on Marrickville Road was a lovely Chink, a nice young fella.

Jenny liked listening to Muriel’s stories, liked to enjoy Muriel’s sunny outlook, which was especially happy and generous on pension day, but she couldn’t invite Muriel inside her house… that would be too much, Muriel might never leave, it would be an invasion. So when Peter was out or out of it, and Muriel had lost her key, they’d sit on Peter’s concreted front verandah, the thick leaves of the yucca curling in the middle of the patch of brown lawn below them, yarning, sharing cups of tea and a laugh. She’d rarely leave Muriel alone when the older woman was waiting like this: although she admitted to herself that it was a kind of procrastination she would have felt guilty going inside to stare at her computer screen while her neighbour sat outside alone.

There’d never been a night so far when someone from Muriel's mob hadn’t either woken up or come home to let Muriel in. But Jenny was beginning to think it wasn't going to happen tonight; it was already 1.30. She thought of her spare room with its neatly made up single bed and was embarrassed and ashamed that she didn't want Muriel in there. She told herself "if it gets to 3am I'll invite her in to sleep."

Muriel had been brought home in a little blue car by a woman from the other side of Marrickville, after being evicted from a taxi. Jenny reckoned that Muriel’s accent along with her alcoholic slurring would have made it impossible for the cabbie to know exactly where she wanted to go – she pronounced “Francis St” as "Prancess St” – but at least he’d got her to Marrickville. The woman in the blue car must have struggled to get both Muriel and her walking frame into the tiny vehicle, and – watering her Jasmine – Jenny had to laugh as she saw the car stop-starting up the street, the walking frame's metal legs sticking out of the hatchback, the driver peering at the numbers in the twilight. Muriel never remembered which house it was.

Jenny & Con

Walking down the steps of Marrickville station, sun already strong enough to fry an egg on one of the metal handrails, she saw Con. A big, overgrown toddler… chunky legs and arms, a huge round face, small features twinkling in its vastness… a big tummy and thick neck. Dressed in ironed shorts, a freshly nappy-san’d white tee shirt, his trademark luminous white runners and socks pulled tightly halfway up his calves.

“It’s coming, train’s coming soon” he said to a small Asian woman carrying an imitation Louis Vuitton handbag.

“Not long now, train’s coming” he told a young man with a goatee and white ipod-ears.

“This platform, train’s coming soon” he told Jenny, and she smiled, “Hi Con, how are you?” He took her hand and kissed her on the cheek, asking her “how are you?” staring into her eyes. At this point in her regular encounters with Con she was always struck by his masculine adultness – the look he was giving her was intense, very much like the kind of unflagging attention she used to get from boys she’d gone to uni with who wanted to... well, you know. But that wasn’t part of Con’s agenda; “train's coming from that way” he said, letting go of her hand to point towards Dulwich Hill. “Train's coming now!” he exclaimed as its nose came around the bend.

As it pulled in, a clattering blur of blue and yellow, Con forgot about Jenny; he was concentrating. He stood planted there, his big runners firmly apart on the platform, fists clenched at his sides in anticipation. The guard, leaning from one of the middle carriages – an Indian woman with a long plait over her shoulder – waved at him as she whooshed past. Just as he’d been waiting for her, she’d been watching out for him. Con was known to all the train workers who came through Marrickville, and the bus drivers for routes 423 and 426 all knew him too… he liked buses nearly as much as he liked trains. After he saw the guard waving at him, Con clapped his arms together like a seal, jiggled on his toe-tips and threw his head back, mouth open in a huge smile.

Jenny had only seen the kind guard’s expectant face for a moment, and yet it was enough to see that the woman had been looking out for Con as much as he’d been looking out for her… And it was then that Jenny realised that she also looked forward to seeing Con, to having him hold her hand and kiss her cheek and look at her with his special sort of intensity. And she felt immensely sad, and suddenly very tired. She let herself get on the train with the crowd, sitting wherever. A heaviness set down on her as she realised that she’d spent last night with Muriel, this morning with Con, neither people who really needed or liked her. She was kidding herself with this good citizen, good samaritan bullshit – it was a way to fill in time, hide her loneliness. These were strangers, not real parts of her life, just props. If she moved suburbs she’d probably never think of them again. Muriel would have another neighbour, perhaps less obliging, but really not much different – after all, Jenny reminded herself with shame, she didn’t allow Muriel into the house – Con didn’t differentiate between Jenny and other kind women around the place who gave him the time of day and let him hold their hands. She felt hollow, flattened, angry with herself, and by the time the train pulled into Central it was all she could do to lift herself out of the seat and start her legs moving to get wherever she was going.

spam-poetry

I received this text in the body of a penis-enlargement spam email today. Scarily, the more I read it the more it makes sense. Perhaps I should go and present it at a performance poetry night? I could say "gansevoort to addack py de rear ven ve" in a heavy South African accent.

"Forth only her first calf, at many great sacrifices that
thou laughest upon beholding me? Seeing thee trade. Among
the milliners, several girls were mean, hurriedly, you would
be lovely to marry it, modom? She wears a skintight black
cashmere engaged in their respective avocations. And by
colonel gansevoort to addack py de rear ven ve in the pronunciation
of highly trained speakers towards that fearless warrior.
fearlessly addressing such a sense of relief and quiet.
oh, what a delicious to (a pure) understanding, and having
attained gradual passage of the earth off the face of the."

It's a Man's World

Yesterday Suzanne B picked me up from yoga and we headed out to the Penrith Regional Gallery. We're working on a book together about Hair. Yes, hair. It'll be the first in this series of books. So when we saw that the PRG was holding an "Hirsute Pursuit" competition to accompany its MAN: Depicting Contemporary Masculinity exhibition, we just had to go and check it out. It was a beautiful sunny Autumn day and the shadows were already long by three o'clock.

The hairy competition was part of a "Mister Market" day with stalls featuring masculinity-themed artistic merchandise. My favourite competition costumes were the woman-jesus, and the woman in a woman suit. Neither of them won, which was just outrageous. I told the woman in a woman suit that I'd thought her's was the best outfit and that I thought she should have won. "What can you do?" she replied, "it's a man's world."

See more photos & commentary here.

Poor Neglected Bloggie

I'm writing this post from the airport in Vancouver - I'm on my way home and hoping to do some proper blogging soon.

I've been in Canada for the past few weeks, in Edmonton and in Vancouver, working and attending a conference. See pictures here.

I took 4 days off to drive through the Rocky Mountains - my goodness, it was eye-bogglingly beautiful, scene after scene of craggy cloud-high mountains, all tipped with snow, and conifers and glaciers and bears (well, one bear - hey, I saw a bear!) and elk and a marmot and some long-horned sheep. I went with my dear friend Cressida and we stopped to ski for a day in Jasper (where elk wander along the streets & the rubbish bins are bear-proof). I LOVE skiing, it's totally addictive - I think it's the combination of brightness, coldness, cushioned silence and of course speeeeeeeed. Excellent. Until you fall and sprain your finger or get a nasty ankle-burn, but even then it's worth it.

My conference, transsomatechnics, was rather wonderful too. Cressida and I presented a panel with Lucas Crawford. I had some technical glitches because I over-ambitiously tried to show a series of small extracts from The Swan, Poltergeist, Videodrome and The Ring, silly me, but it was all ok in the end. People seemed to get my idea about "media-bodies" so that was pleasing. I think I'll make it the subject of my next book.

It's hard to choose a highlight from the conference but it was great to meet one of my long-distance mentors, at last, the philosopher Kathryn Morgan. We had some wonderful talks and I now have a new friend.

I was thrilled to also meet Antony Hegarty, who is my all-time favourite singer (I played his bird album every day of 2006, all through my cancer treatments). Antony was absolutely delightful during the performance he gave for the conference attendees - he kept starting songs, stopping after a few bars and telling a little story, then starting the song again. He spoke about his childhood, about the environment, and about gender. He was captivating, modest, humble and very very lovely. If there were more humans in the world like him I reckon we'd all be set.

The only sad note of my trip was that Ruby emailed to say she's found a place to live with some of her friends ... that is, she's moving out of home. I feel bereft. But I know she has to do it, she wants to be independent and of course that's a good thing. But, well, you know, poor me.

Before I went to Canada I had my book launch, and did heaps of media stuff - mostly interviews - radio & a little press. That's me at the top there in the UTS Co-op Bookshop window, with the display that my very talented friend Natalie Coulter made. Isn't she clever? Gleebooks sold out of the book (they'd only ordered 30 copies) on the night of the launch which was very gratifying. It's great that the book is finally out there in the world, doing its own thing - but now I have to wait for the reviews! Goodness knows how long they'll take, or even if there will be any produced at all by the notoriously slowly churning academic world.

Anyway, I have some new ideas for the blog so watch this space...

Important tidbits

Semester is two weeks long now and my classes have almost settled into their final shapes & demographics (students tend to sample or surf elective subjects in the first few weeks to decide what suits them). One of my classes is 90% international students and most of them are from China's big cities. Without resorting to stereotypes, these are not the Chinese students of old: quiet, anxious and with terrible English. They're very urbane, cool, outspoken, stylish, have great English and they're not afraid to question me. Obviously China is changing... Shanghai is on my list of places to go before I die.

I had a great salad yesterday in Newtown - forgot to take camera so no photo - but it was baby spinach, fresh beetroot, fresh peas, mint, fetta and yoghurt. The dressing was, I think, olive oil mixed with that pomegranate syrup you can get from Middle Eastern shops and some balsamic vinegar. The whole thing was purple, green & white: very feminist.

I am 41 and should know better but I was seduced yesterday, post salad, into buying a dress fashioned in the new silhouette. Fashionistas will know exactly what I mean. It has no waist and is balloonish. It ends just above my knees. At least it's black. What I really like about it is that it has nice pockets - comfortable slits either side of my belly button - but this is perhaps not the best reason to buy a dress. There is a risk that in it I will look like a fat little ten year old (from behind only of course).

Today we visit the lovely Stryker, who missed out on our company and bag of carrots last week because Ruby's boyfriend was bitten by a poisonous snake (one of his pets, yes really). Ruby spent most of the weekend in hospital with him keeping a bedside vigil as he was pumped full of morphine. I didn't know that one in five people goes into anaphylactic shock after being given anti-venom, so doctors try not to give it - luckily he didn't need it but he was pretty sick. Anyway, the poor kid is now back home but has lost his sense of smell, perhaps permanently.

I got a first list of corrections from the editor who is working on my book manuscript. He's a blogger! in Glasgow. The corrections were all wonderful - it is just brilliant having someone read your stuff so closely.

My magnolia tree is almost in full bloom - this morning I cut a small branch off & put it in a vase on the mantelpiece, then I made a posy of lavender & rosemary for my round red vase, then I felt all exhausted by my domestic goddessness.

What do you think?

It's been languishing on my desktop for a few weeks, but I've finally posted my piece about roadside memorials over at Sarsaparilla. It's quite speculative - I'd love to know what other people think about these sites.

The beast book; or "all poshed up and no way to phone"

The beast is getting tamer... it is down to about 94,ooo words. I've deleted all the big chunks I think I reasonably can without having to adjust the arguments. I've chucked most of the bits that say what I'm going to say next. A whole lot of footnotes have gone to God. Now I'm just scrolling through it at random making sentences shorter. Limit of one adjective per sentence.

Anyway onto more pleasurable things: yesterday was our 2nd wedding anniversary so Richard and I treated ourselves to dinner at Forty One. It was partly chosen because they have a lot of vegetarian options. I had the "potager" which is a vegetarian degustation meal of seven small courses. Everything was beautiful but there were two highlights. One was the truffled organic creamed eggs, which combined the high comfort of scrambled eggs and that deep truffle flavour that always makes me think of moss. The other was the tiny beetroot jelly, which had a perfect thumbprint on its glossy purple surface (I think that was unintentional, and I wouldn't even have seen it if the light had been slightly different). It was glorious being so high above Sydney... we had a window table & watched the harbour getting slowly darker and all the city lights coming on.

Although I really enjoy them I always feel a little out of place in posh restaurants, coming from Marrickville in my 1985 Honda. I look around at the other people there and wonder if it's a special occasion for them too or just a normal night out. Do they live in mansions? Do they drive Porsches? Do they holiday in the South of France and shop on Rodeo Drive? I identify more with the waiting staff (I was a waitress for years) than the other clients and probably say "thank you" too much. I head off to the toilets to check out the flower arrangements and the little rolled towels for drying your hands. I savour every sip of champagne. Last night I would even have called the kids from the mobile to tell them all about it, except that I had no credit in my pre-paid account as all the cash was going on the dinner!