OUT OF THE CLOSET

I went to dinner the other night with two very hip and happening mover and shaker young women. intelligent and clever chicks who know the latest about the latest everything, the kind of woman i wanted to be when i was the same age as they are now. the kind of woman i want to be now. i felt at times intimidated and in awe and at times older and wiser and far removed.
i tried to remember the feeling i had when i was younger, hanging out with my uber smart, ambitious and successful friends who were all about the same age i am now. how they had seemed to me at the time and whether i seem like that to my younger friends now. does age provide shelter and protection or does it make you irrelevant and an oddity?
i came out of the closet about my age when asked by the friend of my friend. it feels like a dirty secret and even now i don't like admitting it. i don't feel my age. i don't know what that means exactly, but i don't feel like what media expects me to feel at this age. i am supposed to be married and with two kids and a house, yes? Is that right?
i still don't know what job /career i want and i spend a lot of time talking with friends - younger ones in particular - about dreams and what to do next. i seem to consult the young as though i was the same. then i realise that i really am not. i should be wiser and more secure and more at ease.
it isn't that i mind being this age. but i don't feel that i have done enough to deserve this number around my neck. i don't feel like i own it yet. have i been running away from it? it must be time to turn around and embrace it now. like a pair of comfy slippers. but it is such a change in mindset.... i don't know if i am ready.

THE IMPORTANCE OF GOOD ART

good art and good food certainly make a difference on one's mood. i left the hotel this morning slightly hungover, tired and world weary and i return now, almost 17 hours later entirely satiated.
a day of hard work of listening to many artists talk about their art - some with passion and love and real inspiration and others with an edge of unnecessary cool that leaves a sour taste in one's mouth. i hung out with my crew and listened to their funny stories of dropping the microphone on the head of a six foot six actor's head, and debating about our favourite tom waits songs. we drank lots of coffee and rearranged a nice but plain room many times to try and make it look ok for tv. not sure we succeeded, but we had fun nonetheless.

then off to a function honoring the contribution of an important filmmaker - who had stumbled into the cab with me and my colleague last night and whom we had driven to the door of her hotel and made sure she was home safely, and whom had seemed so drunk in an unseemly and vulnerable way and then whom when i saw her today didn't acknowledge me. i love the australian film industry... i was feeling a little exhausted and ignored as i stood waiting for the speeches, and it was only after the event, that i stood in this lovely courtyard with the likes of the moma man and our very own bob ellis discussing the importance of good art, while we all sipped on nice wirra wirra in the afternoon sun that i relaxed a little and started to appreciate where i was and what i was doing.

then off to a film. one we had all been talking about since we arrived. the buzz was electric. i hoped that i wouldn't be let down because of the hype and the friends involved with the making of this quietly anticipated masterpiece. but believe me i wasn't.

Samson and Delilah deserved the standing ovation that grew out of the rapturous emotional applause after it's world premiere here in adelaide. it is powerful and moving, so simple and yet so layered and complex. an eternity of a people discarded and left to fend for themselves combined with the delicateness of a new romance and in the end i was moved to tears, shell-shocked, distraught with the state of the world, but also strangely, somehow uplifted. i haven't felt like this about a film in ages. there was moments in the middle of the film where i felt despair and heartache that came from so deep down that i thought i would crack and fall apart. then i was confused and then i smiled. it was a beautiful, beautiful experience to have in a room full of people. the kind that reminds you why seeing a film in a cinema can be so much more than a dvd at home on the couch.

i would have been happy to go home to bed, the idea of the after party was mildly appealing, but the thought of struggling to convey the effect the film had on me while standing in a room full of industry folk didn't do it for me. plus we had dinner reservations.



auge - with the accent on the a and the cute italian waiters - was delicious... my figs divine - wrapped in proscuitto and with baked gorgonzola, the lighting too dark to photograph them, then followed by garfish and eel baccala and bortaga and a salad of fennel and cucumber was all also amazing.

i am happy. satiated. delighted. and now the couple next door are having loud sex and it feels like all is right with the world.

EASILY DISTRACTED

pesky headache from wine with dinner last night. the first alcohol to pass my lips in 12 days. i am so bad at sticking to things. but dinner was ok and good and spicy so it was worth it. fancy thai at the new spice i am in victoria st. my dining companion and i counted 13 different surfaces used in the restaurant interior design... there is a LOT going on in the room and while it is cosy on a rainy valentines night, it also is a bit distracting. the food was pretty good but expensive. rich and heavy dishes were ordered and probably a better combination could have been had, but i think i found a new fave spice i am dish to replace the ho mok that i have at the old spice, this one is a vegetarian rice paper dumpling that the two lovely ladies made for us on the spot while we ate at the bar. Hmmmmm. don't know the name but i will be back again for those.


so now i am pottering around the new flat, slightly over-hung and slightly creaky. i move from room to room and un-pack a box or do a load of washing up or move a vase or a shelving unit or a piece of art and look to see if it works better against this wall or that. nothing quite gets completed, just left half done. easily distracted. but also determinedly not stressing. i just need to look up and see the harbour and the trees and hear the birds and there is no stress.

so far today i've twittered, i've played scrabble, i've entertained friends and an almost 1 year old boy and all along i've kept being distracted from the tasks at hand - settling in, and even more pressing, doing my tax. for 2006/2007 and 2007/2008. i better do it otherwise no part in the stimulus package for me.

i am the best procrastinator around. i think i have made an artform of it. many will agree. the dearly departed used to yell and scream and wring his hands in despair at my ability to be distracted and to procrastinate. my current beau is more forgiving, but still gets very frustrated and i can see him grind his teeth under his loving smile. the thing is, i don't know where it comes from. once upon a time i am sure i was a driven, enthusiastic, focused sort of person. diligence was something my mother used to always say i had. was that a nice way of saying that i was all heart and no talent?

EVERYTHING IN ITS RIGHT PLACE

Standing at my desk, half packed boxes surround me. I have decided now would be a good time to import a whole lotta music into my itunes. fan blowing occasionally, hitting my legs, my upper body is hot and bothered, sunburnt and sticky. moving house is such fun. less than a week and i am outta here. i start to get nostalgic now. even though my new place is the bomb. big windows, sound of wind rattling through an old deco apartment. i know i am going to love it, even if it means feeling scruffy in super shiny neighbourhood. at least there will be no dog hair on the couch and no passive stoning before breakfast.

the process of unloading shelf contents into boxes stirs up a lot more than dust. there are handwritten cd burns from certain folk who don't come around this way much anymore. distinctive script and i read and could so easily weep, but it's too hot to go down that memory lane tonight. move on, straight ahead. keep on pushing. look to the burning bright future and don't look back.

it is just another way we store and log our loved ones. i can't throw out these souvenirs of a love affair. they are a record along with the sms, voicemail and photos that are locked away in an old nokia handset waiting to be downloaded to some more permanent chamber. where they may join the emails and the photos that have been printed out. a life past and a life lost.

i can't be so sentimental. or maybe i can. afterall, i am listening to ella and louis while i am supposed to be packing.
"the way you wear your hat... the way you sing off key, the way you haunt my dreams, no they can't take that away from me."