A Pitcher Plant

Life is a forlorn, forsaken wildebeest being steadfastly devoured by unseen jaws. It is a gob of spittle, cursorily vented from the mouth of god, which glistens briefly, frail and unconnected, then dissolves. It is a disguise, which no-one will ever penetrate. It is a succulent piece of fruit, which falls untasted from fumbling fingers, and is consumed by oceanic silence.

And yes, it is, of course, an idiot's mindless rant, the ear-splitting sound of which can all too easily obscure its lack of substance.

It is all of this, and more besides - an unintelligible surfeit of sensory data, an infinitude of wrong answers to an impossible sum, an old man with a harelip drooling in remembrance of the breast, a joke that boasts a different punch-line every time it is told, the corpse of a unicorn presented in bite-sized chunks to a woman without a mouth.

A pitcher plant.

To Live Is To Endure

Distraught today. The gap between my aspirations and achievements is yawning wider than ever. If I could die without repercussions, here and now, I would do so, without regret, for to live is to be consigned to unrelenting disappointment, loss, frustration, anti-climax and despair.

To live is to endure, continually, without the possibility of solace or reward.

Escapism

Escapism: all very well in small doses, I suppose - after all, honesty is both painful and energy-sapping. However, we have somehow managed to construct an entire culture out of it, viz:

George W. Bush

mobile telephones

make-up on women

Pop Idol

tattoos

tobacco

"make mine a double"

make-up on men

high-heeled shoes

shopping malls

fast food

more more more more more more more more more more more more

now now now now now now now now now now now now now now

God bless America!

Ants!

Only Sister Mary Paul was allowed to use the cane. The other teachers had to make do with a ruler, or the back of the hand. As far as Sister Mary Vincent was concerned, this was highly unsatisfactory, and a source of considerable, very obvious irritation. But she was not to be defeated.

Looking back, I am not sure exactly why she earmarked me to be the regular butt of her most fiendishly distinctive brand of chastisement. Most teachers – including Sister Vincent initially - tended to ignore me, which was how I liked it. By half way through my time in grade four, however, Sister Mary Vincent seemed to have decided that I was sorely in need of corrective intervention, and that in order for it to be effective it needed to be applied at least once, and sometimes twice or more, daily.

At first, this simply meant a hefty smack or two with a ruler, either on the hand or – much worse – the back of the leg. However, it soon emerged that the only noticeable effect this had was to magnify the esteem in which I was held by my classmates. Even David Sindocic, whom Sister Mary Vincent ironically appeared to like (perhaps discerning in him a similarly malicious turn of mind), seemingly found it hard to quell his admiration.

Sister Mary Vincent was never as calculatingly, invidiously inventive as when presented with a dilemma. On this occasion, it seemed clear that what was needed was a punishment that would demean and distress me, whilst simultaneously depriving me of the mitigating solace afforded by my fellow pupils. In the end, the solution she concocted fit the bill superbly; it was, in all respects, a concept redolent with unadulterated, diabolic genius.

If Sister Mary Vincent shared Sister Mary Paul’s intrinsic vindictiveness and hatred of all that was spirited, individual or Quixotic, she was nevertheless, in purely physical terms, her antithesis – red and shiny where the headmistress was pallid and sand-papery, angular and imposing rather than flat and moribund. She was also considerably more animated and intense, if rather less prone to sudden, frequently alarming mood swings. Although in terms of general iniquity and malice there was probably little to choose between them, there was no doubt in my mind that Sister Mary Vincent was, by some measure, the more potent adversary, as her compulsive malevolence was much more imaginatively deployed, and hence was infinitely harder to evade. Moreover, unlike her boss, she actually appeared to realise that I existed, which inevitably had the effect of augmenting my validity as a target.

Such was the extent of Sister Mary Vincent’s wickedness, she was even known to punish girls. Indeed, on one epochal occasion, which had a particular significance for me, she actually smacked a girl. But more of that at the relevant time.

Not all of my feelings regarding Sister Mary Vincent were negative, however. She inspired a considerable amount of loathing and dread, to be sure, but intermingled with such feelings was more than a modicum of admiration. Like her, I was occasionally subject to sadistic impulses, and fully appreciated the frisson to be gleaned from according them imaginative rein.

If you want to understand the essence of the psychology of effective torture, you need only watch a cat playing with a mouse, one moment molesting and humiliating, the next tantalising with spurious offers of liberty. For it is in the context of apparent security and self-confidence that pain is most acutely felt.

Before leaving England, I used from time to time to play with Georgie, a toddler who lived a couple of doors away from me on the same street. At the time of the incident I am about to describe, I would have been about four and a half, while he would have been at least a couple of years younger. He regarded me with a combination of trust and low key adulation, while I, in return, was affectionate, playful and protective. Together, it seemed, we inhabited a mutually constructed bubble of safety and contentment, a veritable haven from a sometimes waywardly vindictive world.

One especially warm summer’s day as we were playing happily together on the pavement just outside our homes, I was suddenly, for no apparent reason, presented with a starkly vivid and powerful mental image of Georgie drowning in Stanley Park lake, splashing frantically and wailing plaintively as he tried without success to attract the attention of passers-by.

As I came back to myself, and was confronted by the immediacy of Georgie’s supple, vulnerable flesh, his myopic, idiot eyes, the paltry flicker of his upstart imprint on a world in every sense too big, too real, too unforgiving to sustain him, I recognised him, probably for the first time, as a fellow victim, as someone who was born to suffer. The hands he sometimes stretched towards me, whether in supplication, or beseeching support or reassurance, were meant to be impaled; they might, indeed, have been inviting nails.

“Look here, Georgie,” I said, “I’ve got something for you.”

Without even seeing what it was, he cooed his appreciation, as do nearly all the condemned.

With almost devotional precision and solicitude, I placed a squirming ant upon the unprotesting whiteness of his neck.

“Ooooh – tickle!” said Georgie, laughing, for this, of course, was just a game.

I promptly added another ant. Then another. And another. Soon ants were crawling over virtually every centimetre of exposed flesh on Georgie’s body, while others had begun exploring beneath his clothes.

I laughed, perhaps not quite unkindly. “Now Georgie’s the ant boy!”

But Georgie’s acquiescence was on stilts. He tried to emulate my laughter, but his skin was harbouring rebellion. His bottom lip became unwieldy. He collapsed.

“Ants!” he whimpered. “Ants – no like!”

But I was forced, or chose, to misconstrue. “Yes, Georgie – lovely ants!” Depositing a mercilessly writhing handful on his scalp.

“No, no, no!” wailed Georgie, as the weight of sudden insight began to pull. It tugged at him in unfamiliar ways, as everything became inverted.

I laughed aloud, delighted to have given such release, although I was simultaneously aware of having cauterised.

“Delighted as I always am to see my pupils deriving pleasure from their education, I fail to see exactly what you’re finding so hilarious, Mr Devaney. Perhaps you’d condescend to enlighten us?” Sister Mary Vincent’s deceptively playful, lilting words were skewers to my reverie.

Knowing better than to attempt to answer my accuser’s actual question, I said, as meekly as I could, “I’m sorry, sister.”

She made the same face my baby sister Angela made when breaking wind, and sighed. “I fear we may be taxing you, young man,” she said, removing a piece of paper and a pen from her desk drawer. “Happily,” she added, and she looked it, “it’s not an irresolvable dilemma.”

As Sister Mary Vincent began writing something on the piece of paper, an almost imperceptible hum arose, which gradually magnified. Contributing to this hum was Arthur, who whispered, helpfully, “You’re for it now…...”

“Quiet!” shrieked the banshee of Christ, as she removed an envelope from her desk drawer, and placed the piece of paper on which she had just written inside it. “You!” she hissed, pointing in my direction. “Out here – now!”

I lurched into the unknown on palsied limbs.

“Take this to Sister Mary Damien,” she told me, handing me the envelope.

I blinked up at her, trying to discern a hint or two as to my destiny from the expression on her face, which was, however, neutral.

“Now!” she caterwauled, propelling me toward the door with a brutal shove.

Without really taking the time to think the matter through, I saw no option but to comply.

Black Swan

Much of life is spent creating, or maintaining, an acceptable appearance - a veneer, if you like.

Take the swan: ostensibly controlled,unflustered, elegant - above the surface of the water. Below it, though, all is frantic, ceaseless, convulsive energy, the cessation of which would inevitably, and almost instantaneously, bring disaster.

In a vast lake full of white swans, I am the only black one.

Damien The Demented

Sister Mary Damien taught the babies’ class. She was extremely tall and thin, with a swarthy complexion that had the apparent texture of worn leather. Both her face and hands were covered in dark brown moles of various sizes and shapes. The largest were the dimension of a sixpence, and sprouted an assortment of thick, greyish hairs. I had never previously enjoyed a first hand meeting with Sister Mary Damien, but I already knew that I found her penchant for smiling incessantly, with what I imagine she thought was winsome charm, rather irritating. She also happened to be just about the most hideous-looking human being I had ever seen.

Having knocked on the door, and been invited to enter, I walked over to Sister Damien, who was sitting at her desk, and handed her the envelope. “Thank-you, dear,” she said, in a breathy, cherry-sweet voice more appropriate to a child of five than a full-grown woman.

I waited as she tore open the envelope, and, smiling iridescently, cast her eyes over the contents of Sister Mary Vincent’s missive. I wonder if they like one other, I mused, Sisters Damien and Vincent. Do they perhaps go shopping together? Or sit curled up alongside one another on the sofa, drinking cocoa, and chortling at Bewitched, The Dick Van Dyke Show, or The Flying Nun?

Or did they endeavour to avoid one another at all costs, addressing one another with studiously manufactured politeness, through serried teeth, whenever communication was unavoidable?

Having read the note, Sister Damien screwed it up into a tight ball and dropped it into the metal waste paper bin at the side of her desk. She sighed, presumably with pleasure, for she was smiling even more pronouncedly, like a Cheshire Cat, or a four and a half year old boy collecting ants on a sunlit Liverpool side street.

When she struck me across the head, it was with such force that, for a split second or two, I actually lost consciousness, coming ‘round just in time to prevent myself from falling over. By then, Sister Damien had grabbed me roughly by the collar, and was herding me towards the corner of the classroom nearest the door. “You can stand there quietly and face the wall,” she breathily informed me, “until I decide that you’re ready to join us.”

Then, addressing the forty or so confused looking five and six year olds in her class, she announced, “We have a new boy with us today, children. I hope you’ll help him feel at home. Sister Mary Vincent sent him to join us because he’s been finding the work in grade four too hard. Please be kind to him – it isn’t his fault he’s so stupid.”

The children dutifully giggled, albeit with some apparent uncertainty, while I stood gazing at the wall, battling intensely with a torrent of debilitating feelings, of which humiliation, stupefaction and anger were foremost. I was forced to remain in the corner until after recess, when I received my formal induction into the multifarious delights of Sister Mary Damien’s quaintly surreal approach to education.

“A is for apple – yum yum!” I reluctantly recited, all the while attempting to ignore the intrigued stares of my temporary classmates. “B is for bird – tweet tweet!. C is for cat – meow! D is for dog – woof woof!”

All the time, sharpening and polishing her knife with palpably iridescent glee, Sister Damien appeared to be focusing all her attention on me, her God-given talisman of hope. She smiled, of course, and continually, luxuriating in the glitteringly idiosyncratic mirage of redemption she had concocted. From time to time she sought to reassure herself, as well as to remind me of my status, by stabbing at me, half playfully, half in earnest, and grinning with gratification as I flinched.

“If I have ten grapes, and eat three, how many grapes will I have left?”

“Seven, sister,” I replied, sullenly.

“Good boy!” Her merry, lilting voice a cat-o-nine-tails.

During both recess and lunch time none of my friends, other than Arthur, would have anything to do with me, and even Arthur seemed subdued as he gazed with thinly concealed longing at the rest of the grade four boys playing ringy-up, or brandy on the wall, or kick to kick. I stared at them too, vicariously enjoying the sudden, sharp pain as the fiercely flung tennis ball rebounded off a leg, or back, or arm, or buttock.

Mental pain was worst I began, if tentatively, to understand.

According to my school diary, the ensuing three week period saw me demoted for the day, mostly to grade one, but once or twice to grade two, no fewer than half a dozen times. Sister Mary Vincent, it appeared, was fully aware of the crushingly demeaning nature of the punishment she had conceived, and derived explicit solace from administering it. It might indeed have been an act of worship, with the seraphic host endorsing it by igniting the majestic candle into which Sister Mary Vincent’s luminescent face had seemingly, one might have believed miraculously, transformed.

At night, in bed, I lay curled up in a ball, like a threatened caterpillar, wide awake, denuded and confused. Escape seemed quite unlikely, but I somehow realised that, unless I made at least a gesture of defiance, I ran the risk of consigning myself to a lifetime spent squirming at the end of a hook.

A Common Social Neurosis Examined

The worst apologists for religion are those who practise it.

Death's Allure

Managed to attend my weekly therapy group session, chiefly by pretending I wasn't me. As usual, I was the only man there (men, as a general rule, are inherently self-sufficient, and so do not need therapy).

We discussed the things we fear most, and all but one of the women came up with death. When I told them death was one of the few things I didn’t fear I don’t think they believed me. I tried to explain. “Death is the absence of everything, including fear,” I said. “Everything I fear is bound up with living, because living generates desire, and desire is never satisfied.” Aware that I was sounding a little fatuous, like some crackpot, coffee-table, Californian quasi-Buddhist, I added. “I don’t mean that in any pseudo-spiritual or esoteric way. I mean it in hard, practical terms. Whatever you want, the opposite happens – in raw, experiential terms, that’s as close to an observable physical law, such as the law of gravity, that I’ve come across.”

At that point, X accused me – quite gently, it must be said – of showing off, of wanting to come across as macho and tough, which caused me quite a bit of amusement. “If I really was macho and tough,” I countered, “I wouldn’t be so terrified of life.”

For once, even she had to admit I had a point.

A Flawed Alliance

What do you mean you weren’t sick?” asked Arthur. “Why didn’t you come to school then?”

I produced a somewhat smug smile, and tapped my nose.

Arthur initially looked disgruntled, then suddenly excited as enlightenment dawned. “I’ll bet you only pretended to be sick,” he declared. “Faked a temperature, forced yourself to puke – fooled your mum that way.” He seemed impressed, though whether with himself or me was hard to tell.

“Not even warm,” I said, lying back on the lawn in our favourite corner of the school playground, and chewing serenely on a desiccated stalk of grass.

“What then?” demanded Arthur. “You know you can tell me, whatever it is – I won’t squeal.” He looked at me almost imploringly. “We’re mates, aren’t we?” he felt it might assist his cause by adding.

I casually removed the grass stalk from my mouth and tossed it aside before manoeuvring myself into a sitting position. “I just felt like a coupla days holiday,” I told him. “That’s all – no big deal.”

Arthur balanced my disclosure on his own tongue and started to evaluate it by tentatively sucking. “But what about your sick notes?” he demanded. “I saw you giving ‘em to Vincent – so don’t deny it!”

“What about ‘em?” I replied.

“Your parents must’ve at least thought you weren’t well to give you a sick note,” he suggested. Then, suddenly animated again, “Or did they have special permission to take you somewhere?” His born again face was riding on the breeze, alert with all the possibilities of freedom.

“Cold, cold, cold,” I taunted, as I stretched myself out once more across the saving lawn.

“Ahah – of course!” exclaimed Arthur, giving himself a theatrical smack on the side of his head with the palm of his hand. “You had to go the dentist, didn’t you? That’s not quite the same as being sick.” By proffering a qualifying remark like this, Arthur presumably believed he was bolstering his chances of being right, and his normally pallid face was flushed with certitude as he warmed to the imminent prospect of his achievement.

I rose again to a sitting position and helpfully commenced a summary of the key facts that Arthur had so far uncovered, counting them off sequentially on my fingers as I spoke. “OK, point one – I wasn’t sick. Point two – I never pretended to be sick. Three – my parents didn’t have permission to take me anywhere. Four – no, I didn’t go the dentist’s. Five – yes, I did give notes to Sister Vincent when I came back to school after being off. Six – the notes said I’d been sick. Seven” – and here I looked mischievously into Arthur’s eyes; I may even have winked – “Seven,” I repeated, “ – neither of my parents wrote, or knew anything about, those notes.” I grinned, with what was in truth only a vague approximation of triumph, as I had started feeling bored. “Add all that up, and what do you get?”

A shadow of alarm momentarily darkened Arthur’s features, but was quickly replaced by a combination of incredulity and awe. “Have you been playing hooky?” His words were precious jewels, wrapped up in a deceptively nondescript cloth bag, and then carefully removed.

Blithely, to fuel the vestiges of my enthusiasm, I nodded.

For a few moments, Arthur seemed to have forgotten how to breathe. “Why’d you do it?” he eventually asked, determinedly suppressing his astonishment, but forced to gulp in any case from trepidation, or alarm.

“I’m sick of spending the day with the babies,” I informed him. “It’s driving me nuts.”

Arthur knew to at least appear consoling. “It doesn’t seem fair,” he agreed, “the way she only seems to pick on you.”

“Anyway, I’d had enough,” I went on, flicking exasperatedly at the ground with my index finger. “I’ve no desire to be a martyr,” it somehow seemed appropriate to add.

Arthur was regarding me with seemingly unabashed admiration. He might indeed have swooned, had not conviction suddenly burst like an over-inflated balloon. “Hang on a minute,” he said, “what about the sick notes? You said they were sick notes, but your parents didn’t write them……..”

“That’s right,” I conceded, suddenly enjoying myself once more.

“That means,” said Arthur, visibly daring himself to draw the obvious conclusion. “That means – if – if you – you didn’t?”

I grinned, and nodded. “Yep,” I said, unnecessarily.

“But – but – but – .” Arthur’s mouth was farting in bewilderment and disarray. For a couple of seconds, he looked as though he would have liked to have refused to believe, but a sudden wave of admiration swept aside all doubts. Arthur was rolling on the grass then, contorted by mirth into a helpless abandonment of unremembered limbs. “That’s fuckin’ amazing, Devaney!” he chortled repeatedly, only partly for reassurance. “Absolutely fuckin’ amazing!”

All at once, he came to a stop, and sat, staring at me, in the thrall of a sudden, overwhelming impulse. “We should do it together,” he said simply.

I stared back at him, uncertainly. If the Sindocic brothers had contrived the simplistic (and erroneous) theory that I was a goody-goody, there could be little or no doubt that Arthur was the genuine article. “Are you sure?” I prodded, suspecting that his reaction had been distorted, or perhaps even created, by the senses of relief and liberation he was feeling at having finally uncovered my secret.

“Of course I’m sure!” he insisted, a little too swiftly and determinedly to convince.

“All right then,” I said, “let’s do it tomorrow. I’ll be waiting for you in the scrubland near your house at half eight in the morning. We can go up into the hills, or spend the day at the Centre together.”

“No worries!” agreed Arthur, with a keenness that was almost tangible. His traitorous eyes, however, told a different, more predictable tale.

Blind Justice

Charlie’s grandparents reminded me of my mum and dad, or rather of how I imagined my mum and dad would end up. I never observed any demonstrable affection in their relationship, and to all intents and purposes they inhabited separate worlds. They did not even sleep in the same bedroom as one another. In a sense, the only important thing in life they had in common was a shared solicitude for the welfare of their grandson.

I found Charlie’s gran to be a cheerful, uncomplicated, essentially kind-hearted person, who almost uniquely among the adults of my acquaintance, seemed actually to like me. I have reason to suspect that she disapproved of the fact that my parents frequently resorted to corporal punishment with me, but never with Barbara. Consequently, she would often give me treats, such as lollies, chocolate, or home-grown grapes from the garden, or engage me in conversation of a sort that implied a real respect and interest. (Most adults never conversed with you: they either told you what to do, or simply ignored you.)

Charlie’s grand-dad – always known as ‘Pop’ or ‘Pops’ – was equally good-humoured, but rather less enamoured of me. On occasion, he would take both Charlie and I out, most often to the footy, but sometimes to other places. These were seldom happy trips, as putting Charlie and I together for a prolonged period of time was more or less tantamount to lighting the touch paper leading to a large quantity of gun-powder in an enclosed space. The length of the touch paper might vary, but the end result was always the same. Although Charlie’s grand-dad was scrupulously careful to deal – or at least be seen to deal – even-handedly with the inevitable contretemps that emerged between his grandson and me, I got the impression that, deep down, he actually blamed me for them. At any rate, after one particularly acrimonious afternoon spent watching West Torrens play Sturt at Adelaide Oval, he decided that enough was enough, and there were no further trips. Even back then, I could see his point of view. After a week spent working hard on the railways, the last thing he needed was to have his Saturday ruined by a pair of fractious, bickering, ill-tempered boys.

If Richard and Arthur jointly fulfilled the role of ‘brother as soul mate’, Charlie was their exact converse, the quintessential brother as rival. In effect, if not reality, he was an only child, occupying centre stage in his grandparents’ affections, and used to getting his own way almost without question. As a result, he did not cope at all well with the give and take which are so essential to a healthy friendship, and which tend to be second nature to kids with siblings. Charlie was also a year older than me, which I suspect he felt meant that I ought to subordinate my will to his in cases of disagreement. Given that I was used to endeavouring to impose my will on that of my younger siblings in the context of a parental regime which palpably favoured them, this was never going to happen.

One of the first trips that Charlie and I took with his grand-dad was to an air show at nearby Edinburgh airfield. Charlie’s grand-dad did not have a car, and so we walked. The air show itself was much less my particular cup of tea than Charlie’s, which automatically confirmed him in the dominant position he imagined was his by right. For most of the afternoon, therefore, he was happily able to impress me with his knowledge of the various aircraft on display, although in truth my interest was negligible.

If that seems a little sarcastic, let me stress that Charlie’s knowledge on matters such as these was genuinely impressive. If I sometimes found his attitude of assumed superiority difficult to tolerate, I nevertheless admired, indeed looked up to, him greatly. Of all my friends, he appeared to possess the liveliest and most wide-ranging intelligence, and it seems to me highly probable that another reason for the antagonism which so frequently erupted between us was that I was jealous. Privately, I aspired to many of the attributes that Charlie seemed so admirably to manifest, but my inherent state of confusion about the world, coupled with the battle I was engaged in to free myself from the collective delusional psychosis in which I had been enmeshed almost since birth, conspired to render these aspirations unattainable. This inevitably produced a high level of frustration, not to mention a certain feeling of inferiority, both of which might well have been alleviated to a degree had Charlie ever displayed any genuine warmth of feeling, or even a touch of humility, towards me, but for reasons outside his own control this was never possible.

It was on the return journey from Edinburgh airfield that things got out of hand. We were still walking along the road adjacent to the airfield when Charlie and I came across a toy scooter which had been abandoned, although it was hard to see why as it was still in almost pristine condition. Thinking that Christmas had come early, I promptly claimed it for my own, feeling both confident and justified in so doing on the grounds that Charlie already had a scooter of his own, not to mention a bicycle, while I had neither. I should have known better. Charlie immediately claimed that he had seen the scooter first, and it was clear case of ‘finders keepers’. A vigorous tug-of-war then ensued during which the scooter risked being broken in two. Finally, Charlie’s grand dad intervened, and wrenched the scooter out of our hands. Confident that the justice of my case was undeniable, I was reasonably relaxed at this development, but it quickly became clear that justice was the last thing on Charlie’s grand dad’s mind. All he wanted was a peaceful walk home. “Neither of you can have it,” he declared, and for a few minutes we walked on in silence, Charlie and I on either side of him, alternately eying the scooter he was carrying and one another with mingled avarice and acrimony. Charlie’s grand dad was obviously uncertain what to do next, but when we reached a large, muddy ditch at the side of the road he finally decided. Walking to the edge of the ditch, he held the scooter high above his head, almost in triumph, and hurled it as hard and far as he could down into the mud.

Charlie seemed perfectly equanimous about the way matters had been resolved, and I could not help imagining that he had not really cared about having the scooter for himself, but had merely wanted to ensure that I did not get it.

I do not no whether Charlie’s gran was told about our little difference of opinion, but somehow I suspect she was. At any rate, I do not believe it was a coincidence that, when I had a day off school a few weeks later for some Catholic holy day of obligation or other, she called at our house during the morning and asked if I would like to borrow Charlie’s bike for the day. Charlie had never even allowed me to touch his bike before, let alone ride it, and so, whatever Charlie’s gran’s motives were in allowing me this dispensation, I was hard pressed not to interpret it as a belated conferral of justice.

Hiding From The World

When the rain started, I headed for my favourite bolt-hole, an old abandoned water pipe that lay on some wasteland just outside Elizabeth North shopping centre. Curled up in the middle of the water pipe I still felt fairly cold, even in my duffel coat, but at least I was afforded a measure of protection, not only from the rain, but also, to some extent, from the lacerating impact of my own thoughts.

It was five to ten in the morning, which meant that I still had almost six hours to endure before home time. Had Arthur been with me they would have been six hours of fun rather than endurance, but Arthur, exhibiting the characteristic common sense that made him in so many ways my superior, had let me down, as in all honesty I had known he would, and so my third day of truancy, like the previous two, would be a prolonged, intermittently excruciating battle with the feelings of inadequacy engendered by my afflictions at the hands of Sisters Damien and Vincent.

At least I would have the illusion of being in control, however, of having at least retaliated, if not quite triumphed.

Earlier that morning, I had remained aboard my bus for two stops longer than usual, eventually alighting at the end of Tolmer Road, a couple of hundred metres or so from Arthur’s home. At almost exactly half past eight, and somewhat to my surprise, Arthur had emerged from his house and ventured across the road to the patch of scrubland in which, perched behind a tiny bush in a gesture of concealment, I was waiting, as per our agreement.

Things were not as they seemed, however. “I can’t come,” said Arthur, without preamble, his studied frown not quite masking the underlying sense of relief I was hardly surprised to discern. “Dad said he’d drive me to school this morning because it looks like it’s going to rain.”

“Oh,” I said, which in the circumstances seemed the safest.

Arthur muttered something about being sorry, said he’d see me at school, and left me to confront both my demons and my destiny alone. His departing footsteps were the hurried, ungainly ones of the not quite penitential.

Because of the impending rain, I decided to head for one of the local shopping centres rather than venture into the hills, where finding shelter might prove a problem. Curled up in the water pipe I experienced an illusory sense of inviolability. Being enclosed was tantamount to being set apart, to being held in loving arms.

The rain became torrential. To pass the time, I recited lists of trivial facts that I had committed to memory: the average distances of each of the planets from the sun; the names of all the footballers in the 1965 Mobil Footy Photos card series; premiership teams since 1907; obscure statistical information about various dinosaurs – height, length, weight, number and size of brains; the names of the fifty American states; the world’s capital cities and their populations; the names, nicknames and colours of footy clubs from Victoria, Western Australia and Tasmania; and so on.

Eventually, the rain abated, and so I walked across the intervening strip of wasteland into the shopping centre in order to check the time. To my horrified disbelief, I discovered that it was only twenty-five to eleven. Nevertheless, I returned to the sanctuary of my water pipe, and spent a few minutes eating a couple of my lunch time sandwiches. Then I visited the toilet, and on my return to the water pipe decided to eat the rest of my lunch.

Returning to the shopping centre, I peered into the window of the library to scrutinise the clock on the wall behind the counter. It read eleven fifteen. I would have liked to have gone into the library and spent some time reading, but I knew it would be too risky. However, the thought of reading gave me an idea: I returned to the water pipe, took my Wide Range reader out of my satchel, and spent what I convinced myself was a good three hours or so immersed – as far as that was possible - in the irreducibly tame, straight-laced, passionless tales contained therein.

When I next visited the library to find out the time it was twenty past twelve – still nearly four hours before I could realistically head home. I might have elected to move on and find myself another hiding place, but the rain had begun again in earnest, and so I had no alternative but to return to the water pipe.

Although my school uniform was hidden from view beneath my duffel coat, I carried a satchel, and was clearly a boy of school age. It might seem strange therefore that no-one confronted me, and asked me what I was doing at the shopping centre. However, although I was only nine years old I had already acquired mastery of the art of remaining invisible, an achievement that most people do not manage until it is effectively thrust upon them during old age. While playing truant I visited shopping centres in Elizabeth North, Elizabeth Park, Elizabeth Downs, Elizabeth Vale, Elizabeth Fields and the city centre. I paced the streets of all these suburbs and more. I lay in water pipes, sat at train stations, and played on swings, slides and climbing frames at various playgrounds. Not once during all this time was I so much as spoken to by an adult.

Perhaps I actually am invisible, I thought. Perhaps I don’t exist.

At two thirty or so the rain relented once again and I decided to head for home. I would tell my mum that we had had football training, but the coach had cancelled it because of the weather, and sent us home early. She would believe me. She almost always did.

Mont Plonk And The Chosen Three

When he finally reached the summit of the divine mountain, the great samurai Mikalo stood with his back to the slowly setting sun, spread his arms out wide in a gesture of benediction and thanksgiving, and addressed his faithful followers thus:

“In the illustrious name of the Kaliwara ninjas I hereby claim this great mountain, along with all the land visible as far as the horizon in every direction.”

The acolytes cheered.

“Let this mountain henceforth be a place of celebration, thanksgiving, remembrance and sanctuary.”

Despite not understanding some of their leader’s words, the acolytes cheered once more.

Then, crouching to his knees, Mikalo stretched forth his hand to indicate a six inch long semi-circle of dog faeces that had been rendered black and brittle by prolonged exposure to the sun. So desiccated had it become, that even the flies eschewed it. “Nothing happens by chance or outside the controlling harness of divine will,” Mikalo declared. “Therefore, in the full and certain confidence that to do so is to align ourselves more completely with the purposes, resources and actions of the divine intelligence, I hereby have pleasure in naming this mountain…………. Mont Plonk!”

The acolytes became suffused with excitement, and began waving their swords exultantly above their heads. “Mont Plonk!” they chanted, almost drunkenly. “Mont Plonk! Mont Plonk! Mont Plonk!”

Mikalo, who in terms of the self which he habitually proffered to the world for scrutiny was actually highly sceptical about the existence of a divine intelligence, nevertheless evinced apparent conviction by virtue of his aptitude for role play. Aware, at some level, that we are all comprised of many, often mutually contradictory, personae, he was briefly relishing the specious consolation to be derived from wearing a bridle.

The acolytes were similarly enhanced, if not quite liberated, whilst simultaneously abandoned to an image of consummation.

It had been a long, challenging, at times unglamorously irksome day. Even during the initial part of the journey, while they were still travelling through civilised parts, there had been problems. On one occasion, a group of ragamuffin children had taunted and insulted them. A short while later, they had been pelted with stones by another gang of urchins.

“A ninja does not respond to intimidation from those beneath him in status,” Mikalo reminded them, and they walked steadfastly on, neither changing pace nor displaying any outward signs of emotion.

They encountered their first significant challenge when they arrived at the River of Relinquishment, which must be traversed in order to enter the Badlands. Although the dry season had already started, the river still flowed deep, and, as everyone knows, a ninja, being a creature of air and fire, does not get his or her feet wet if it can be helped. “We shall build a bridge,” announced Mikalo, and he promptly set to work gathering stones for that purpose from along the river bank. The acolytes fell to assisting, and soon they were able to commence the process of laying down a pathway of stones across the mighty waterway. Their crossing proceeded smoothly until, half way over, one of the acolytes, Dogsbody, could not resist the urge to stoop down and examine the bed of the river for signs of frogs or yabbies or fish. Suddenly, he overbalanced, and catapulted head-first into the water. “Oh, shit!” he exclaimed.

The great samurai Mikalo, who was already on the Badlands side of the river, was livid. “Have you no self-control?” he scolded.

Meanwhile the second acolyte, the one who gloried in the title of Chief Ninja, had paused in his progress across the bridge, and had turned around with the intention of helping his comrade, only to lose his footing, and plummet backwards into the water with a mighty splash. “Cripes, my new sandshoes,” he wailed. “Mum’ll kill me!”

Together, the two chastened acolytes clambered back onto the bridge and scurried across to join their leader, whose florid face, sardonic smile and gleaming eyes suggested a degree of amused satisfaction that, as one entirely wedded to the Cause, he could not possibly have been feeling.

The River of Relinquishment flows from north to south, and the Chosen Three were now standing on its western bank, confronted by a vast expanse of grassland. Spectacularly green and lush for the time of year, it stretched for an unknown distance away to the west, but had nevertheless to be negotiated before the Badlands proper could be reached.

“Many tales are told of those who have entered the Fields of Doom never to return,” Mikalo the samurai informed his followers, in a hushed voice not entirely devoid of excitement. “Extreme caution, therefore, is needed.”

Turning to the Chief Ninja, who was busy pouring water out of one of his sodden sandshoes, Mikalo said, “You, in your perfect camouflage of green, will lead the way. I will follow, and you, Dogsbody, will bring up the rear.”

And so they ventured across the legendary Fields of Doom, slowly, warily, slithering like snakes, the green carpet giving way before them like a parting sea.

The grassland came to an end as abruptly as it had begun. Ahead lay an enormous expanse of open countryside, completely barren, brown, and hostile apart from an improbably large slab of slate grey rock in the middle distance, a handful of uninspired, underdeveloped shrubs, and, almost on the horizon, a couple of green-tinged clumps of what perhaps were gum trees.

The Chief Ninja waited until his leader and Dogsbody had crawled alongside him and then said – because, as second in command, it was his right – “What now?”

Mikalo pointed in the direction of the isolated rocky outcrop. “The Altar of Enlightenment,” he said, almost reverentially. “I have heard tell of it, but never thought to see it with my own eyes.”

“What’s the Altar of Enlightenment?” asked Dogsbody, impertinently.

The samurai graciously chose to ignore the indiscretion, and said, “First we must reach it, and then I shall tell.” With that, he heaved himself to his feet, and sprinted off across the intervening wasteland, followed soon after, albeit at a less frenetic pace, by the acolytes.

The Altar of Enlightenment was almost perfectly rectangular in shape, proving, or at least strongly suggesting, that it was man-made. Some six metres long by four metres wide, it rose almost a metre from the ground on its eastern edge, descending to just over half a metre high on the opposite side. Dogsbody immediately started to clamber up but Mikalo placed a restraining hand on his shoulder. “Wait,” he commanded.

Sniffing querulously, Dogsbody nevertheless obeyed.

Mikalo then extracted his still nearly full water bottle from his sack and commenced a slow, anti-clockwise circuit of the altar, pausing every few paces to sprinkle several drops of water onto it. As he did so, he muttered indecipherably, and made seemingly random arcane gestures, vaguely comparable to a priest bestowing a blessing, with his right hand.

The acolytes sniggered, but by the time Mikalo had completed his circumnavigation and rejoined them they had recomposed their features, and were standing dutifully to attention. “Since I have temporarily annulled the negative energies associated with this place,” the samurai announced, “it will now make an ideal staging post.”

The two acolytes looked at one another with thinly concealed amusement, each silently challenging the other not to snigger again. In this, they might not have been successful if Mikalo, having already climbed onto the altar, had not immediately instructed them to follow him.

“What negative energies?” asked the Chief Ninja, as the three of them sat down together near the centre of the altar.

Mikalo looked grim. “In ancient times, this was a place of ritualised torture, execution and sacrificial offerings – both animal and human,” he explained. “Such activities leave marks.”

“Marks?” asked Dogsbody.

“Scars upon the cosmos,” Mikalo said, whose face, impressively, was almost preternaturally emotionless.

There was a brief pause, and then, “What sort of methods of execution were used?” the Chief Ninja could not prevent himself from asking.

“Oh, the usual,” Mikalo answered, somewhat blithely. “Disembowelling, beheading – both partial and complete, crucifixion, slicing in two, throttling, burning or boiling alive, tearing limb from limb, hanging, variations on the death of a thousand cuts…….”

The acolytes contrived to seem appalled. “Beheading wouldn’t be too bad,” mused the Chief Ninja. “Or slicing in two, or hanging. But I wouldn’t want to be burned to death or crucified.”

“Me neither,” agreed Dogsbody. “I’d like to be beheaded by a guillotine, but not an axe or sword,” he decided.

“Enough!” said Mikalo. “We have scarcely begun our journey, and must complete it by nightfall. Let us quickly refresh and fortify ourselves, and then continue.”

The next stage of the trip was easily the most onerous, if also in some respects the most unmemorable, as, under the heightened ravages of the searing sun, they made their way across the Desert of Confusion.

After travelling for at least an hour, Dogsbody said, “Those trees on the horizon are just a mirage, aren’t they? They don’t seem to be getting any closer.”

But Mikalo simply said, “Everything is as it should be,” and proceeded to increase the pace a little.

Shortly afterwards, both of the acolytes ran out of water. Mikalo, on the other hand, despite having expended some back at the sacrificial altar, still had almost half a bottle to spare.

“Such wanton intemperance is unforgivable,” he said, and might indeed have been felt to taunt, had not his status as a samurai precluded such censoriousness.

And no, he later told them, I shall not share my remaining water with you – although not out of selfishness, he hastened to reassure himself, but merely to teach you a lesson.

But neither of the acolytes felt thirsty.

Suddenly, almost miraculously, they found themselves in the proximity of a small clump of gum trees, known, according to Mikalo, as the Forest of Forgetfulness. “This is a place of spiritual refreshment and retreat,” he informed his followers, stressing the word ‘spiritual’ in a way that, in truth, only he was sufficiently sophisticated to find meaningful.

Indeed Dogsbody, who liked to think of gravity as an irritation rather than a law, was already half way up the nearest tree.

“That ruddy kid brother of mine,” hissed Mikalo, sotto voce, to the Chief Ninja, who wondered briefly whether ‘ruddy’ was a bona fide swear word, of a sort to elicit purgatorial flame and torment, or just a harmless slang expression.

“You’ll only make yourself thirsty,” Mikalo said to Dogsbody, who had neatly perched himself between a fork of branches two thirds of the way up the tree, and was looking down on his associates with what might have seemed, but almost certainly was not, an element of smugness. Blessed with a roseate disposition that derived from his natural disinclination to reflect on things, Dogsbody, for the most part, simply was.

In retaliation, or perhaps to quench his thirst, Mikalo indulged in a swig or two of water, but this only had the effect of encouraging the Chief Ninja to emulate the arboreal exploits of his younger comrade, albeit with noticeably less verve and skill.

“We’ll rest then,” suggested, or conceded, Mikalo, and, propping his weary form against the weathered trunk of an almost entirely negligible gum tree, he proceeded to do so.

Yesterday I Was A Wood Louse

Yesterday was hard to the point of being unendurable. I really do not want to be where I am right now, but the one means of escape available is not an option because it would bring pain to others. Recognising that should bring a certain sense of consolation, I suppose, but it doesn't.

I did manage to go out for a while, protected by my personal stereo (John Coltrane, Camille, Nick Cave, Cat Power - a day for Cs). As I approached the corner of Castle Square a quite detestable, ominous-looking figure approached me, and so I crossed over the road to avoid him. However, he re-appeared, this time even closer, and then I saw that he was me, or rather my reflection, striding ominously towards me from behind a cafe window.

I turned around, and, like a wood louse, scuttled back to claim the spurious refuge of my hole.

Rumbled

The penny finally dropped for my mum when, for the third time in little over a week, I alleged that my early arrival home from school was attributable to a cancelled football training session.

“I thought you only had football training on Fridays,” she said. This was a Wednesday.

“Oh, this was a special extra session,” I explained.

“But it was cancelled?”

“Yes.”

“Just like last Friday?”

“Yes.”

“And last Wednesday as well?”

“Er, yes.”

“I see. So what else did you do at school today?”

“Oh, the usual stuff.”

“Like?”

“Sums. Reading. A spelling test.”

“And did you get any homework?”

“No – I mean yes.”

“You don’t seem sure.”

“I nearly forgot.”

“What homework have you got then?”

“Writing and sums.”

“Good thing I reminded you, isn’t it? You’d better do it then.”

“OK.”

A little unnerved, I retired to my bedroom to do my imaginary homework. A couple of minutes later my mum came in and closed the door behind her. Uh oh. Perching herself on the edge of my bed she said, “Why don’t you tell me what’s really been going on?”

Carefully manufacturing a look of innocent bemusement, I blinked up at her. “Huh?”

“I know you haven’t been going to school,” she told me. “I found out from Mrs Bouwmeester.”

A surge of panic rose, which I struggled to keep from inflicting itself on my features. Best say nothing, I thought, and did.

“Well?”

Keep calm, don’t say anything, avoid her eyes – perhaps she’ll give up and go away……..

“Well?” she said again, much too soon, and I was forced to acknowledge that my chances of escape did not look promising. So, somewhat hesitantly, with what I hoped was just the right air of indignation, I told her about my victimisation at the hands of Sister Vincent, and my persistent, almost daily, demotions to the babies’ class. When I had finished, Mum looked, and was, furious – but not, I was surprised and extremely relieved to discover, at me. “How long has this been going on?” she asked me.

“Coupla months.” I saw no harm in exaggerating matters.

“A couple of months! Why didn’t you say something?”

I just looked at her. Tell your mother your most shameful secrets? Who was she kidding?

“We pay a lot of money for you to attend that school,” she informed me, with obvious bitterness. “In return, we expect you to receive a proper education, not waste your time doing grade one work!”

It was, I had to admit, a pretty valid point, albeit one that had not occurred to me. I wondered briefly how much money my parents had effectively thrown away subsidising my dozen or so days in Sister Damien’s class, not to mention the days I had refrained from attending school at all.

“Right,” said my mum, using the business-like tone of voice that was frequently the precursor to a thrashing, but on this occasion her ire was directed elsewhere, “if you promise me never to play hooky again, you won’t be punished.”

It seemed a wholly reasonable deal to me, so I nodded.

“In the meantime,” she went on, “your dad and I are going to have a quiet word or two with Sister Mary Paul.”

With that, she got to her feet and headed for the door, only to pause just before she reached it, as though she had suddenly remembered something. Turning to me with a wry smile on her face, she said, “How’s your homework coming on?”

Somewhat reluctantly, I uncovered the exercise book that I had been covering with my elbows throughout our discussion, exposing to my mum’s inquisitorial gaze my somewhat extravagant, half-finished drawing of a triceratops engaged in a frantic and bloody life or death tussle with a tyrannosaurus rex.

“Mmm. Delightful,” said Mum, although she clearly meant the precise opposite.

Not that I cared. Energised and inspired by my unexpected acquittal, I set to work embellishing, and subtly amending, my drawing. Against all the apparent odds, the beleaguered triceratops was destined to survive, in the process consigning its seemingly invincible adversary to an abrupt, appropriately turbulent demise.

I never again played truant, and although I remained one of Sister Mary Vincent’s favourite penological targets, my regular exposure to the deranged wrath of her colleague, Sister Damien, was over. Whether the pair of them are still alive, or enduring perpetual torment in the deepest recesses of the non-existent hell in which I still irrationally believe, I cannot find it in me to wish them well.

Chinese Finger Trap

Yesterday was one of those days when, no matter how hard I tried, all I could think of was the pain, the failure, the disappointment and the loss. Indeed, like a Chinese finger trap, the harder I tried to wriggle free of these thoughts, the tighter I became enmeshed in them.

I must be very, very evil to be punished so horrendously, and with such adamantine persistence.

Memories

The doorbell rang. Ignored it. Lay on the bed, staring at the ceiling, my mind a maelstrom of thoughts, impressions, recollections.

Nothing tangible can be trusted. Nothing tangible, least of all other people, will save you. Only memories are real. Only memories matter. Refuse the rest.

What I Did Today

Today I wrote and slept.

I hated what I wrote, but enjoyed the process of writing it. I tend to feel the same way about my writing as I feel about myself. Sometimes I find it almost tolerable; usually, however, I loathe it.

Sleeping is better than writing as it brings you closer to the truth. I do not sleep nearly enough.

How To Save Polar Bears From Extinction

I'm in favour of the reintroduction of the death penalty for:

* anyone who listens to the likes of Radiohead, Take That, Coldplay, Robbie Williams, Muse or Boyzone, not simply because it's the 'done thing', but because they actually like them

* spammers

* people who whistle while walking along the street

* annoying, talentless little chancers like, but not including, Mika

* anyone who accepts a job he/she doesn't really need, and which could be done equally well by someone without a job

* the bloke who always stands next to me in record shops, sniffing uncontrollably

* anybody who has the same tastes today as they did 30 years ago

* anybody who has the same tastes today as they did 20 years ago

* anybody who has the same tastes today as they did 10 years ago

* anybody who has the same tastes today as they did last week

* everyone who's ever dreamt of being on Big Brother

* men with moustaches, but no beards

* women with beards, but no moustaches

* every politician incapable of passing a lie detector test

* irritating old farts who whinge incessantly about stuff they don't like