Sunday, March 16, 2014

wilson's prom national park

She wakes up early.  Still dark out.  No birds singing or cooing.  She wakes early.  No matter that she went to bed at 12.  No matter that she tossed and turned all the night before, sleeping less than not.  Too hot inside, couch cushions soft.  Growing more and more restless.  Missing hard ground.  Crash of waves.  Bugs between the fly and tent screen.  She wakes up.  In a west melb. suburb.  Bed to herself.  Pulled in around a stuffed sheep and a blue kitty.  No want to communicate with anyone.  No want to be brave for anyone. Period soon.  These feelings of contraction.  She knows.  She knows.  She knows.
Tries to sleep again.  No.  No sleep.

Some ease between the up and down?  Flight gone missing and land mines still claiming limbs.  Ozone. Whole.  What is it?  No more than a half glance and a hi from most bushwalkers passing by. "AWKWARD," her insides screamed.  A coworker at the bakery once said he never felt awkward.  That that word was overused.  What is awkward?  Its a twisting of the insides, a shrinking away while trying to reach.  Reach.  Reach.  "I want to connect with you!"  New friends.  Friends of friends.  Randoms walking by.  No words said.  Eyes diverted.  "Keep to myself."  She knows how to keep her own company.  Knows how to be her own best friend.  Ride the waves of exhilaration, loneliness, peace and overwhelm.

She knows.  She knows.  She knows more than she speaks.  In a world that demands of her: speak! explain! reason! show.exactly.what.you.mean!
"Can't," she says.  Won't."
Squatting low in the grass.  Dusk colors of grey sky, dark greens and browns and one wombat with his short legs, stumpy and nibbling in the grass.  Stillness everywhere between them.
Can't tell you.  Can't speak or even move the way yellow-tailed black cockatoo screeches swell up the cells in her body.  Can't say.  Can't explain.  In a world full of do do do.  And she pauses to watch a long fuzzy caterpillar crossing crumbling rock and golden soil.  And she stands with her shoulders finally dropped.  In some sort of conversation with a gang gang cockatoo.  Flown into the loneliness room so her heartmonster could find his way out of there.



Wednesday, March 5, 2014

how to get into the birding spirit

first:  find an enthusiastic friend known from years ago, with color coordinated style

second: drive to primo bird habitat on outskirts of australian city with ample amounts of wind on an early autumn day

third: oooh and aww and bounce around gleefully at all the varieties of ducks, shorebirds, geese, birds o prey, songbirds, and LBTs you get to see  (though unfortunately declined up close photographing)

and finally:  celebrate at home with no hands dessert - home-made vegan chocolate-cherry cake!

birding spirit achieved!

(big thanks to Hayden and Julia for their fine hosting and photo taking capabilities)