Paying Ready Attention

The dawns are a few days and a whole year apart. Both days begin calm and still. Both days become hot. And on both days I am up and about before most of my neighbours are awake. On one of the last dawns of 2011 I drive through the quiet suburban streets of Melbourne. Most of the traffic seems to be rubbish and recycling trucks. Some lucky people are having their bins emptied of all the excess festive glass and paper. Mine will have to wait until next week. In the pre-dawn light all the birds are black birds, just silhouettes on gate posts and street lights. A law abiding couple wait by a pedestrian crossing, pausing before walking across an almost empty road with a closeness that suggests a first date, or a first walk home. Their fingers interlock and they seem to gently bump into each other more often than would have be caused by mere chance. Wrapped in their couple bubble they turn down a side street and walk towards the New Year. The boom gates are shut across a rail crossing as a ...

Out in the car park Musk Lorikeets chatter in the trees, higher pitched and less terse than their Rainbow cousins. Some flutter their wings in submission or possibly courtship. Some dash along the length of branches in short sharp movements, their feet hidden by fluttering wings. They look like second rate stop frame animations, where all the money has been spent on colour rather than continuity. Their short pointy bodies and short pointy tails turn them into flying crosses. They fill the morning quiet with their voices and the morning sky with their wings. I pause to watch, then walk towards the pool. The glide off the wall is a silky surge of freedom. You pop up to the surface, take one stroke and breathe. Three strokes, right. Three strokes, left. Repeat, repeat, repeat. I reach the far end and turn gracelessly. A fumble turn. Glide, stroke and breathe. Use your feet more. Lift your elbows. Watch the way your hands enter the water. Be here now, in this moment. Not watching TV in a ...

A butterfly flaps its wings on the down slope of the Himalayas and later, far out to sea, a storm forms where one would not have been. The storm alters lives, but nobody blames the butterfly. John is attacked by a feral wheelbarrow and comes off second best. Later, but not that far away, I board a plane for Perth. My week changes, but I don’t blame the wheelbarrow. The tic, tac, toe of chaos marks out the squares across our lives. We think we are in control, but that seems to be a myth. Chaos is not in control either, but it does lie outside the door of order, scratching like a dog on a cold night. Desperate to be let in. Keen to enter our lives. I arrive at the airport and check myself in. In a strange and marvellous plan the airline aims to improve its customer service by removing all contact with their staff. I suppose I could just shout at myself when my booking can’t be found, or ask to see my own supervisor to sort out any problems. But thankfully all goes smoothly. I recommend ...

Nothing changes a landscape like darkness. As the primacy of the eye gives way the more subtle arts of ear and hand, as the surety of footfall morphs into the uncertain step, the world changes. For country dwellers the change may be less marked, used as they are to the changing of the day, but for city kids and urbanised adults the darkness of night is both unusual and scarce. From pools of yellow streetlights to the blue glow of TV’s, cities are full of light. The country is a different matter. Down on Johanna beach at the failing of the light, the night and day merge uncertainly, with little ebbs and flows. Day hangs on to the western horizon and lights up the sky for one last hour. The colours reflect in the wet sand beach and hold on for one last minute. The surf break glows for one last second . And then, with the sun below the horizon, just a strip of light remains. The foam of the breaking waves seems to pick up the last few rays of light and glow, faint and even ghostly, into t...