Paying Ready Attention

“One cannot be uncheered with a balloon” a rather famous bear once said. And while this is clearly true - only the deeply, resistantly, grumpy can remain uncheered by a balloon - it could also be said “One cannot be uncheered by parrots”. The simple fact of the matter is that I like parrots. However, none of the parrots that I have seen have passed on their opinions of me. This seems a familiar, distant adoration, the reawakening of a teenage relationship, where you stare at the subject of your affection, but that source is blissfully unaware of your thoughts. And would probably be scornful in dismissal if it was aware. But such thoughts are of little consequence here. Parrots will brighten your day, but I doubt they will break your heart. Twice over the last week I have found flocks of parrots around my home. Their calls, silver and weird, have pulled me from the house to watch them, high in the trees, feeding, calling, being there for no purpose but their own. At first glance parrot...

I visited an island this weekend. Not a large island. Not an impressive island. Held in the muddy waters of the Yarra, flanked on one side by the freeway and the other by school boatsheds. The drone of engines on one side and the strain of muscles on the other. It is reached by a very short journey on a flat bottomed punt with an engine of seemingly unnecessary size and power. For a place surrounded with water it was surprisingly dry, with dusty paths, stressed plants and many weeds. There are barbeques and at one end an art gallery. This shows we are not on any regulation island. Both islands and rivers bring easy life references, one a clear destination, the other a journey. Sitting in the Yarra the island is a surrounded place in a linear feature, a dot within a line. While noisy miners live up to their name in the bushes and magpies follow you, begging for food, this is not really a place to visit for the wildlife. This is place you visit for the abstraction of sculpture, rather t...