Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER.

What the fuck is today about?  It’s so exciting to finally be here.

I CAN’T WRITE!!!  Where does that come from? Thank you to Martel and Catherine, Martel for coming here before me and encouraging me to give it a go and of course Catherine, with the great rack, for being herself.

She has given me the simple courage to come here and try, just try, write like I’m on fire.

I feel on fire, all the bullshit resistance has fallen away….so much resistance and nearly all of it inside me.

Alcohol, my love and hate relationship with you.  What was my Achilles heel has turned into my biggest blessing and strength.

I AM FREE from you and free in my world.  The excitement of wondering who I am and deciding that myself.  Who do I want to be, how do I want to be in the world.

Do I have the simple courage to dare to be me?

Yes I fucking do!!!

Maybe writing, what I thought was a weakness is my strength?

Get the scum out, get the resistance out, just keep going.

Get to that quiet place, the place of knowing inside where it comes from, where it all comes from, the place that feels safe and like home.  The place that was buried under fear and pain and trauma.  Where I hid from the yelling and violence.

Where I hid under the booze and sex and the running, the running from here to there, from suburb to suburb, state to state, country to country, relationship to relationship, from man to man to woman and back again.  That place inside called what? Home? Safety? The Goddess/God within?

I don’t know its name.  I don’t want or need to know its name.  But I know it is there.  I seek it out.  I love it, it is mine and I found it through simple courage.

I hope you find yours as well.

Title: Peace
My name: Lee-Anne Poynton

Peace – such a rare feeling for me, to feel calm, at peace, one with the world.

No more desire to fight, to swear, to hate, just to be at peace.

I’ve forgotten what it feels like but I love it when I get here.  To write away the hate and anger, get it out, put it down and leave it there.

To be at peace, I love you when you come, and stay awhile.

Title: Simple Courage
My name: Lee-Anne Poynton

The simple courage to begin, to begin a new chapter, with no fear of age or talent or skill or perfect.

The simple courage is now, the right time is now, always now.

The simple courage to dream, anything and everything, big or small, to stop or go back.

The simple courage to finish, to reach the end, to push forward, to limp, to stumble, to fall, but always forward.

The simple courage to be simply courageous.

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Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER.

Here I am at Gunnas Masterclass trying to write the first creative thing I have written in a long time. I am surrounded by people candidly sharing their experiences of overcoming anxiety, depression and cancer, negotiating the politics of mothers’ groups or working for evangelical Christian organisations. And they all seem to have an idea for a book mapped out in their heads. I remain quiet and say nothing until Catherine turns to me, hoping I can come up with something that sounds as equally impressive as the people who went before me.

‘So, why are you here?’, she asks.

‘I want to rediscover my passion for creative writing.’ I say, or something along those lines.

‘You have a book in you,’ don’t you she asks.

‘Yes I say’, with a confident tone of voice. I say something about it being a fiction book for young adults with themes such as a journey and self discovery.

But the further we get into the class, the more I question myself. Should I write fiction or non fiction? Maybe a combination of both. And what exactly will my novel be about? Should my character be me- a quiet introverted person who doesn’t reveal much and is hung up about having a disability or should she be the self that I wish I was? A strong, bold confident woman who happens to have a disability but doesn’t let it define her? I don’t know the answers to these questions yet, but I know that somewhere hidden deep inside me is a character and a story that is waiting to be brought to the surface and I have to go and find it.

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Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER.

Somewhere between draught and flood, famine and feast, girl and boy, is a world of ordinary magic.

Thirsty, scratchy grass underneath me feels like the end of a long summer’s day.

Ants run in orderly zig zags over my arms and legs. Skinny and strong, perfect for a five year old, Pop says. These are the mountain ranges exploring ants must conquer. They squeeze through the creases in elbows and wriggle behind knees, they seem to like the tiny tears of sweat. Sometimes I feel a tingling sting. I pretend I’m in Mass and concentrate on being still. “Hail holy queen mother of mercy hail our light, our sweetness and our hope”… I never have to go far into the prayer before the pain goes away. Practice makes perfect. That’s what grandma says.

When I grow up I want to be Marilyn Monroe. But with a penis. And I want a vagina too. I’m the only one of my friends who knows what penis and vagina are.

Ants are ants are ants. I stare into the grass as close as I can get before the grass tickles my nose. Bodies in three parts, head, stomach, bum. I see no vaginas or penises. I squint to find a mark, a freckle, a mole like the one on my nose, a darker shade of ant skin, something special that makes one stand out from the rest.

They all look exactly the same.

Sometimes I wonder if people would be happy if they were all the same.

What would happen if an ant were born different? Would its mum still love it?

Or would she eat its head until it died?

What if an ant had an accident? Lost a leg or antenna?

Like Barry Tyers in the war. He lost both hands. Sometimes I have to help him get into his house when he’s had a few too many. No one is mean to his face but people call him Mad Bugger Barry and say he’s as useful as tits on a bull when he’s not around.

If humans were like skinks we could regrow body parts. They drop their tails when the cats grab them and then grow new ones. Perhaps they have a special quiet place to go when they are mending. Like mum, she’s on the mend now, again.

A leftover crumb from my egg sandwich loses its grip on my singlet and falls thousands of feet onto the grass. One ant stops. It turns and runs to the next ant in the line. They cuddle each other’s antennae and then the second ant runs back down the line. Then like a magic trick a hundred more appear from nowhere. They know exactly where to go and what to do, the crumb is lifted like a trophy onto proud ant shoulders.

“Climb every mountain, ford every stream, follow every rainbow til you find your dream.” I sing for them, for me for all of us. This crumb will feed many. I have saved the lives of a thousand starving ants.

In the time it takes for me to blink, a sparrow swoops down from the washing line and snaps crumb and ants in her beak and flies off across the yard into Ken and Betty’s place. And just like that I am a murderer.

It’s getting late. Shadows from the mulberry tree grab at my hand. I am not allowed to play in the mulberry tree. I get filthy searching for silk worms and the blood red juice drips all over my clothes. We do the washing once a week, grandma, mum and me, in the copper under the house. Mulberry stains take forever to scrub clean mum says. Worse than blood mum? Yes, even worse than blood.

Mum how can something that you love so much be so much trouble?

It’s life, she says. Just life.

 

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Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER.

Once upon a time there was a girl. She was one of 4 children. The youngest, to be exact. She spent her days staring at wheels. Watching them spin endlessly forward, over and over, day after day, minute after minute, spoke after spoke. Her dreams all seemed to go in a circular fashion – a roundabout of fractured ideas and pictures that never really seemed to have a beginning, a middle, or an end.

She lived with her 3 brothers in a small house on the outskirts of a large, blackened town. There weren’t many years between the boys, but she had been an after thought – arriving a good 6 years after the last. Subsequently she was left alone a lot with her own thoughts, left to her own devices as a small child. She would invent imaginary friends and acquaintances to play with, creating a thickly-woven fantasy world that made her feel at least a bit less lonely.

Every day she would use her mind to take her and her new friends on adventures that flew her far away from her monotonous real life. A life that saw her brothers go off to town to perform a lowly circus act for the townfolk in the streets. One day her friends suggested that they follow her brothers into town to find out what they did with their time, and what other delights they could uncover within the monochrome buildings. She packed a little bag for the day, complete with an apple, some beans from a neighbour’s garden and a pair of clean socks (just in case), and as her brothers got ready for their day’s work, she busied herself with tidying the kitchen and hanging out the washing.

Her brothers were none the wiser as they set off to town, walking in broken step towards the horizon. She motioned to her friends to follow her lead, and she quietly followed from a distance, making sure not to draw their attention. She needn’t had worried – they were far to involved in their conversation about the day’s plan to notice their baby sister trailing behind them.

She was able to easily make her way without detection, a quick shadow picking flowers along the way, watching her brothers closely whilst fashioning herself a floral crown. Her ever-present friends encouraged her along, renouncing all fear of being discovered with a skip in their step, no fear of being marched back home.

Finally, the town that had been slowly growing bigger and bigger on the horizon became all at once real, and the smell and sounds of a city filled her senses. Bolstering her confidence, her friends called her name and championed her on, pointing out where her brothers were turning corners and keeping her safe.

At last she saw her brothers stop and decide upon a place to set their wares down, which consisted of two bicycles, some thick sticks, plates and 2 wooden chairs. She watched with interest, hidden behind a shop-keep’s stall, as they set up a box with the words“The AMAZING Circle Brothers” emblazoned on it. Her eldest brother started to gather the crowds with a loud, booming voice, telling of the wonders that they would see should they stop for a moment. She stood, frozen with anticipation at what she would see, without understanding that she would be watching her future, and the wheels that would become her end.

 

 

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Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER.

 

Jonathan wound the tiny generator on the side of his flashlight. The winder caused friction inside the mechanism, charging the battery and pushing electricity through the weak globe.

The light flared. Once. Twice. And a third time with each turn until he had enough momentum to maintain a constant beam.

Jonathan kept walking. And winding. He had to be near the end.

The Metropolis Guard had found his old path from the wastelands of Williamsburg into the shining bronze metropolis. But he had heard of an old tunnel from New Jersey into the north end of the island. No one could say for sure that the Holland Tunnel hadn’t flooded during the first storm. But those who survived had said that it was still there. The entrances sealed with the dead still inside.

The flashlight shone a path through the graveyard of sedans and SUVs, completely rusted with no reference to their once shiny exteriors.

Rumour was that the corrosive mist had found its way into the tunnels. Packed full of cars. The cars packed full of people, there was no way to get out before it ate its way through your skin. There weren’t any bodies to be seen. But there wouldn’t be, not after the fog.

‘Slow down!’ His breathless companion stumbled behind him.

‘You said you could keep up.’

He looked David up and down. He looked like he belonged in the metropolis. His face hadn’t been worn from years of exposure to the mist. His hands didn’t bear the calluses of someone who had worked a day in their life. But he insisted on coming. He insisted on breaking onto the island to find his friend. To find the Clockwork Girl.

David stumbled again, catching himself on a crumbling Mercedes. The tiny badge still standing triumphantly, against the rust.

‘It would be faster without you.’ Jonathan snapped.

‘Except she won’t come with you unless I tell her to.’

‘I’d just carry her.’ He wasn’t lying, he was tall and years of living off the mist ravaged land had made him strong. What could a small girl do to stop him carrying her away?

‘Are we seriously going to argue the difference between rescuing her and kidnapping her?’

He was right.

‘How much further is it?’

Jonathan held up his hand. ‘Shut up!’

‘Don’t ta…’

Jonathan shushed him again.

It was echoing off the tunnel walls. The faint buzz, growing louder.

‘Put your mask on!’ He ordered.

‘But.’ David objected. ‘The tunnel was sealed.’

‘They must have sealed it in.’

The buzzing was growing louder. Jonathan pulled his sleeves down and tucked them over the his thick gloves. He zipped up the dirty grey jacket to his chin, grabbing the mask hanging from his belt, he quickly checked the filter. He hadn’t changed it. He didn’t have any spare. It’ll have to do. He thought to himself and pulled it over his face. Hood up and pulled tight.

The buzzing echoed off every curved wall. It rang in his ears.

He could barely see through the goggles. He looked to David, he was pulling his hood tight.

Jonathan signalled to keep moving.

He sucked in a breath and felt the resistance of the old filter. Struggling to let air pass through, it was clogged from one-too-many uses.

The flashlight was holding strong, but he guessed they’d have another five minutes at most before he had to wind it again.

It hit them. The whirring, buzzing, dirty mist. A swarm of corrosive fog that searched for gaps in his clothes.

Jonathan felt a sharp twinge, where a vein of mist had found its way under his clothes. They couldn’t last long down here.

He grabbed David’s hand. He screamed C’mon! Not that he would be heard through the mask.

The way out had to be beyond the mist. Somewhere not far away.

Jonathan sucked in another breath. The filter barely letting anything through.

They stumbled into cars. The flashlight now doing little more than to show him a few inches into the swill.

They hit a wall at last. Jonathan sucked in another breath, only this time no air came. The mask suction tightened on his face. He didn’t dare breathe out. He didn’t want to break the seal and let the mist get inside the mask.

He frantically ran his hands along the wall, desperate to break out and to rip of his mask.

David’s hands ran past his, in large circles around the wall.

He found it. A large round valve. He tried to turn it. Desperate to breathe again. It didn’t budge.

Jonathan found David’s hand, still searching the wall. He pushed it to the valve. David immediately started to try to turn it. Jonathan joined him.

The both strained until it gave. First a small notch, then an inch, it kept giving, bit by bit. Until, Jonathan heard the distinctive hiss of the hermetic seal. He threw his weight into the door and pushed it and David who was still trying to turn the valve.

Even through the layers of clothes, he felt the cool clean air. Mist free.

Jonathan resisted pulling off his mask to breathe again.

He pushed David into the room and slammed the heavy door before the mist could seep-in. Winding the valve until the seals on the door were tight.

He ripped off his mask and sucked in a deep breath. The air tasted of damp and mould. But he didn’t care.

The flashlight had died. Jonathan’s eyes were adjusting. This room was lighter than the tunnel. There must’ve been an opening up ahead. He was still breathing hard.

Something kicked him. He jumped back and looked down.

David’s mask was still on. His hands wrenching at it to get it off. His filter too full to breathe.

Jonathan found his knife on his belt. He threw himself of David and pulled his hands away from his face. David didn’t understand. He went straight back to the mask. Digging his fingers under the seal.

‘Stop.’ Jonathan ordered calmly.

David’s hands froze, but didn’t move. They clung to the mask.

Jonathan carefully slid the sharp knife under the worn leather strap, slicing it with a sharp tug.

He pushed the mask up and David gasped in. His neck gushing blood where the knife had nipped him.

Still straddling him, Jonathan could feel David’s belly expand with each deep breath.

David sat up, his face falling into Jonathan’s chest, he kept gasping in deep breaths.

They sat like that for a long moment, until both their breathing slowed. The cool are was gentle. A breeze from somewhere nearby breaking-in.

David leaned back and looked up a Jonathan. His skin was still smooth, no scarring from exposure to the mist.

Jonathan leaned down and kissed him. His lips tasted salty with sweat and dehydration. He didn’t care.

damien@djomeara.com

 

 

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Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER.

(A snapshot of something much bigger, to come sometime in the next twelve months.)

The Cancer has shown me that I am loved. It has shown me the pure, unconditional love that my family and friends have for me. It has shown me that there are quite a few people who would be really pissed if something happened to me, how great is that to actually know, not to think or to hope but to actually know!

Love has come in the form of swearing when told the news about “The Cancer”, my favourite swear words flying from one mouth, another swearing in the middle of the shops when she never swears at all. It has come in the form of swearing when I have given people no permission but to be positive – you can bugger off if you are going to be miserable about this.

This is my thing; I choose how we deal with it. Thinking back that is the most powerful part of this last year. I decided right from the start how it would be dealt with … okay I have news, I don’t want to hear any miserable carry on about it, I’m lucky it has been found and it can be treated, it is going to be taken out, treatment done and we can get on with our lives. I’m certain that’s why I called it “The Cancer” taking it outside myself and who I was, that was my way of dealing with it.

One friend kept having to remind me that I was actually sick, I would say something about not feeling up to doing something or being exhausted and not knowing why – he would roll his eyes and say, “Ummm you’re sick, remember?!” And you know what, I didn’t remember, not until I was reminded, I had already decided I was going to just get on with what was required and then piss off back to my life.

The Cancer has taught me that I do actually need to put my health first, I am a dopey cow as it did take getting “The Cancer” to realize that should be number one on the priority list. So now comes the after “The Cancer” thing of reflecting on what I have learnt and what I need to change.

Going to Gunnas Writing was part of that, helping me to get back to my blog (purplesus.wordpress.com) and writing for the love of it, writing to get stuff out, writing observations, taking ideas and making them into something, writing, writing, writing. So I have three projects – What has “The Cancer” shown me is one of them – can’t wait to get started and see where my writing takes me!

 

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Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER.

If I had six months to live, I would relive the year that I have had in double time. Every single one of the 12 months, the 356 days, I would do again, at twice the speed and twice the intensity.

I would relive the heart crushing, emotion-splattering break up with a damaging ex-girlfriend. The emotional growth and resilience was completely worth it, and I love the strong person and passionate, confident lover it has spat me out as.

I would take groups of young people into the developing world again, so they could challenge and push themselves in tough environments. Teaching young people how to do this is a threefold joy. The communities in Nepal and Cambodia benefit, the young people benefit, and my heart benefits from making it happen.

I would spend another house deposit on travelling simply to photograph people and places. I would beg, borrow, and steal the money if I had to. I would spend a week in cooking school in Laos. Consume bottles of wine in London. I would circumnavigate Iceland again in the middle of winter. I would don chadors and sit in Iran’s magnificent mosques for hours, days, fuck it… weeks. I would take more unauthorised portraits, chase the shots I wanted, fill double the memory cards, and never regret a moment paused to take just one more picture. I would let the Turkish men chase after me again for the laughs. Eat all the pizza and all the size 12 women’s shoes in America. Along the way, I would spend weeks with people I love, and meet new people who would enrich my life in ways I could only dream of.

I would make everything I was anxious about happen again; just to prove to myself that anxiety really is a beast of overthought uncertainty. I would run out of money faster. Become unemployed sooner. Break up quicker. Chase love interests harder. And as I took my last dose of antidepressants an accelerated 3 months, rather than 6 months into the ride, I would smile and laugh with such great power and joy that I was the one who was back in the manual, full throttle driver’s seat of my brain.

If I had six months to live, I would still take a punishingly difficult position advising an impossibly complex Evangelical community development organisation in Indonesia. I would cringe all over again at the Wi-Fi password “Jesus is coming”, I would sit through half as many one hour morning devotional sessions, I would have the same disputes with my colleagues, and take exactly the same actions. And I would leave that experience at the 2.5-month mark knowing that I was a stronger, funnier, more resilient person for it.

After Indonesia, I would come back to Australia. Walk into a Rhodes Scholarship interview at Government House knowing that I had created the best person I could possibly be. And get it. It wouldn’t matter that I might not be around to go to Oxford. The most important thing would be that I presented as someone with conviction, zest for life, and vision for whatever the short future might hold.

There’s an exhilarating satisfaction being 23, and creating the exact life I want. A life that makes me happy and thrilled to get up in the morning and go about my day. I hope I have much longer than six months to live, but the most important thing for me is to lead a life where I’m never waiting upon ‘one day’ to lift me out of an un-extraordinary life. One day is right now, and living life in the domain of the extraordinary is the only place to be.

Say hi to Harriet @HarrietHorsfall

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Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS writer.

The “Scum off the top of the Soup”, is what Catherine has just said and is probably going to be one of my new favourite sayings. Get the scum off the top of the soup. Yes. Scum.  There is a lot of it around. Sometimes scum is really big and dominant and in your face and sometimes it just seeps in from the corners and you’re not quite sure how it got there but two seconds later you notice Scum. The word scum even sounds like scum if scum had a sound. Scum Scum Scum. If I said it backwards it would be musc musc musc which sounds better. Musc, yes musc white musc, ooohhhh that used to be a really nice perfume that The Body Shop sold. The highest selling perfume if I remember correctly as I used to work there at The Body Shop at Melbourne Airport. Doing those late nights shifts, forgetting to turn off the shop music and lights because I was so nervous about making the registers balance. The Body Shop where I would lather myself with hemp hand cream and nut body butter and tap dance around the perfume stand when I was bored. The Body Shop with our dicky staff meetings about customer service and giving customers an experience when they walked in. The Body shop when one woman asked me if she could use the olive oil mist on her dry, cracked, bum hole or the guy who asked (really loudly) if he could use the massage oil as a lubricant for his girlfriend.  I even remember being delegated hand massages on one of my shifts and having to give hand massages to customers, some were weird, some were lovely, some people had that dead fish feeling hand, or really sweaty palms or some were young guys who were trying to pick you up and make lewd jokes because you had to massage their sausage thick fingers. Scum! Scummy scum scum. Musc scum. Haha musc scum, put that in a bottle and sell it. See how sales and staff meetings go with that one. Musc Scum, an all over body mist that will send fungus like tingles throughout your body and coat you with an odour sure to piss off most people around you throughout your day. And now that I am at the end of this five minute exercise I have just realised that I spelled musc wrong, it’s musk, but you get the idea, and scum spelled backwards is mucs not musc…but I don’t really know what to say about mucs except that it doesn’t sound as nice as musc or dirty as scum.

 

 

The second piece is from the writing exercise we did after lunch where we had to take a word and a photo.  My word was Shattered and my photo was of a young lady in what looked like a victorian style dress holding a tiger, I think.

SHATTERED ONION

Once upon a time there was a young woman, idealistic, vibrant and vivacious.  She lived in a small town called Shattered Onion and had a pet tiger called Hamlet.  She was the belle of the town known as Louella but affectionately as Lulu by her father (which stuck much to her mother’s dismay) and every man and his dog wanted her.  She was the most attractive and interesting young woman they had ever met.  Except the girls didn’t think so or maybe they did, who knows, but they weren’t as nice to her as some of the boys. Every year there was an annual ball and Lulu had literally a different man knocking on her family’s door every night asking to take her to the ball.  But there was one man who didn’t knock. His name was Iggy and he was tall, with strong shoulders and quiet. He barely spoke but he would watch her every Saturday.  Every time she would cycle past him on her way to the milk store on a Saturday morning he would be at the park across the road walking or playing with his dog and watch her. Not in a stalkerish, creepy kind of way but in a “Woah, who is this person she’s all sorts of beautiful awesome” kind of way.  Of course because of his extremely shy nature Lulu just thought that he was aloof and a little strange but he intrigued her.  Every week she would cycle just a little bit closer and catch even more glimpses of him. One day she cycled so close to him that she saw the stubble on his jaw and then rode off when their eyes locked briefly feeling embarrassed and exhilarated at the same time.

Lulu desperately wanted Iggy to ask her to the ball.

Every day she wished he would speak to her and every day he wouldn’t.  The day of the annual ball came about and Shattered Onion was abuzz with excitement.  Lulu was determined to have a good time at the ball.

“One day he is going to knock at my door” she said out loud with utmost conviction.  She set about getting ready for the ball ignoring her mother’s pleas to accept Johnny or Sam’s invitation to take her. “No I am going to take Hamlet” she announced.  Her mother was aghast.  “Louella you cannot take a pet tiger to a ball.  There are going to be perfectly respectful people there.  The mayor is going to be there!” she cried.

Nonetheless Lulu was not going to budge.  “It’s all your fault Bob,” yelled Lulu’s mother pointing her finger at Lulu’s father, “you have always encouraged her silly notions and ideas. How on earth do you expect her to find a husband when you buy her these silly pets all the time.” Bob just sat there drinking his whiskey quietly and ignored Lulu’s mother. Lulu’s mother went off wailing.  Bob turned to Lulu, raised his glass and winked at her, “you have a good time tonight Lulu love.”

Because of that encouragement Lulu would.  She had her prettiest coral chiffon dress on.  It ruffled out below and had beautiful lace at the bottom.  It tucked in prettily at her waist and cinched in at the edges of her shoulders to show off her slender neck.  She curled her hair, put on her velvet purple hat and she was ready.  With her mother still wailing, Bob was ready at the door. “I’ll give you a lift Lulu love.”

They drove to the annual ball.  The hall was full of young woman and men.  All the woman were ooing and aahing over their dresses and all the men were trying to stand as straight as they could next to their dates.

And because of that it made Hamlet’s arrival all the more dramatic.  Lulu secretly loved that everyone parted before her to let her go by with Hamlet. Many just stared agog while some giggled, one girl yelled out “Couldn’t you get a proper date Louella?” Another guy yelled out, “What a stupid weirdo, stupid girl bringing her stupid cat to the ball.”

“It’s a tiger and his name is Hamlet,” she replied briskly.  She scouted the crowd to see if she could see Iggy anywhere but he was nowhere to be seen. Her heart sank a little but she was going to dance and have a good time anyway. She went into the hall and walked straight to the punchbowl.

Until finally after listening to many songs and politely turning down some offers to dance and especially after all the stares and mocking words she had been hearing she had had enough. Just as she was about to leave she felt the hair prickle on the back of her neck. She turned around and it was Iggy standing behind her.

“M…mm…m…may I t..t…t…take your p…p..ppicture L…L…Louella?” he said shakily holding his camera.

Lulu smiled warmly, “You know my name?” she said incredulously. Wow he even smelled as good as he looked. He blushed a little and looked down and eventually nodded.

“Only if Hamlet can be in it as well,” she said, “Oh and you can call me Lulu.” She said smiling brightly. He nodded again and gestured to the chair for her to sit.  A beautiful upbeat number began to play by the band and Lulu thought her heart was about to burst.

“Just l…ll…..look here L…L…Lulu,” he said and pointed to his camera lens.  But instead she looked right at him. He was shaking with nerves but there was a kindness that shone through and then he smiled and she smiled.  Click, click! Went the camera.

They didn’t speak much for the rest of the night but he sure was a good dancer.  They danced until their feet were too sore and then decided to take a little stroll before Lulu’s dad came to pick her up. Under the moonlight with Hamlet sitting between them they kissed.  It was the best kiss she ever had.  When Iggy pulled away he was beaming. “D…d…do you think I c…could come k…knock on your d…d…door tomorrow to ask you out?”

 

 

 

 

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Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS writer.

Memory is a strange thing. I have always held that memory and language are intertwined. Otherwise, how come we really cannot recall things reliably from our earliest years? And why is it that as we age, our memory begins to fail us and also linguistic faculties appear to also let the side down? I know this happened with my grandmother when she began suffering strokes. The strokes themselves were not catastrophic episodes, but the slowly robbed a vibrant woman of who she had been.

But what about the memories of the beginning of our lives? Who really remembers their first birthday? And just how much detail is there anyway? It is an interesting topic to discuss. I might have to remember it for the next dinner party. It always fascinates me how, and with what, people will respond.

My earliest memory is of being picked up by the police. I am sure I had Scotty, our terrier with me, but I don’t remember him actually being there, and my tricycle that I was furiously riding down the road somewhere in inner suburban Melbourne. I remember the white gates of a railway crossing and the benevolent fatherly figure who placed said tricycle in the boot of the police car before taking me to safety. I was about three. The only other thing I remember is that I told the officer I was going to find my father. Or do I remember that because my mother told me that was what I said to them.

Apparently I had done something very naughty, copped the wooden spoon across me bum and put out into the backyard. After that, everything else is pure conjecture.

When I was three, we lived in Malvern. It was not the Malvern that everyone knows today, but working class Malvern; of Victorian brick fronted houses in neat rows, with bluestone gutters and asphalt; of metal pickets and geraniums in the front garden. The houses that were rented were usually unkempt and unloved by their owners – only that which needed to be done was done. The only other thing I recall about Malvern in 1963 is the milk was delivered in bottles by a horse and cart that would clip clop down our street at around 4 in the morning. And if it woke me it was A New Day, which meant one up, all up. My, how times have changed!

However, I digress. The Malvern backyard of 1963.  It was a reasonable size. The whole allotment would have been a quarter acre.  I also remember that it didn’t have anything in it beyond the ubiquitous clothes line and a dilapidated garden shed/workshop, and our sandpit that my father would have constructed for my younger brother and me. The old dunny was still in the back corner. Although it no longer required the attendance of the Night Soil Man trundling his lorry down the laneways in the early morning. The fence around the property was tall and especially tall for a three year old and a Scotty dog. We have no idea how I was able to unlatch a gate which was at least five feet tall, where the latch was at the top of it, open the gate, which had a tendency to slam shut if not supported; get the tricycle through with the dog and not make any noise whatsoever. Once clear of the side of the house, it was across the front, through the gate at the pickets and off down the street. Not only was I unheard, but also unseen by anybody.

I know what I’m like if I have a bee in my bonnet, so I can picture my tiny self, peddling furiously down our street to High Street and off on my errand to find my father. I have no idea if I chose the right direction, as at three I didn’t even know where he worked.

But what fascinates me about the whole episode is the snapshot images in my memory that on their own mean absolutely nothing. It’s a strange thing.

 

 

 

 

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Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS writer.

Once upon a time there was a young man christened with the unfortunate name of Handsome. He hated his name – of course he did – and his father loved to tease that Handsome was named so because his mother was high on Morphine when her youngest child came into the world. Throughout his schooling years, the other kids teased him mercilessly; but a name is what it is and Handsome was stuck with his. The biggest – or at least most obvious – issue that Handsome faced, was that he was the very definition of ‘unfortunate looking’. He was all awkward limbs and tufty hair; and the smattering of freckles on his cheeks just didn’t seem symmetrical.

Handsome was an introvert. He didn’t much like people, simply because they seemed so alien to him. While his father sat on the couch, reading the newspaper and cursing occasionally, Handsome’s two sisters sat at the kitchen table, absorbed in their homework and conversation about their mutual crush, Andrew, simultaneously.

Every day after school, Handsome took his bag up to his room, flung it into the near corner and forcibly removed his tired shoes. He would sit hugging his knees to his chest, his bony spine resting against the cold metal frame of his bed. Handsome lost count of the hours he had spent staring blankly through the rocking horse his father had brought home from a hard rubbish collection years earlier. His mother always lamented that the dynamics in the family had shifted once the ‘Oops Baby’ followed the twin girls. She said that all the time – particularly when she was shrill and slurring, with chardonnay in hand.

Handsome was supposed to be the man’s man – the brute – but he couldn’t be what he was expected to be. Lord knows how hard he tried. There was the junior football club experience. He really tried to be excited – for his father’s sake – but during the very first quarter of his very first game – smaller and more reticent than the others, he caught a heavy knock and his ear drum burst into pain. Handsome lost his confidence and all desire to play team sports, for fear of getting hurt, for fear of disappointing his seemingly always-disappointed father.

Being alone in his room gave Handsome the opportunity to recharge. His gaze shifted from the rugged rocking horse with the frayed bridle, to the model tractor his father had built with him on his twelfth birthday. That was the last time Handsome had spent deliberate time with his father. It was forced somehow – for both parties. His father just wanted to talk engine size and oil change and diesel. This was a foreign language to Handsome, however, and the allotted time together became punctuated by his father’s stilted sighs, until Handsome’s discomfort was palpable. At this point, his father would mutter something about tidying up his office and he would leave the garage without a word.

Handsome felt as if no one really knew him; he was exhausted by the bullying, the insincerity, his isolation. It was an ordinary Wednesday when he made the decision. He took a coil of rope from the garage, stuffed it in his school bag and smuggled it up to his room. Like every other afternoon, he slumped against the cold metal of his bed frame, staring through the rocking horse against the opposite wall. This Wednesday, however, Handsome wound the rope around his left hand. Two, three, four times around and then he pulled it tight. He felt the constriction, noticed the purpling of his fingers, felt the blood pulsing and pushing back against the ligature. It wouldn’t be any different to tie it around his throat, he thought. The abrasion might be a little tighter, the damage a little more severe – but he was doing them all a favour. Handsome was convinced that his presence was redundant.

‘You’re an introvert’, his mother would say.

Handsome interpreted this to mean, ‘You are invisible’.

He fondled the rope, held it up to his throat and sighed deeply. It was time.

Unexpectedly, the twins were suddenly at the door. They pushed it open without knocking, as they were prone to do.

‘Mum says she’s sick of calling you for dinner. Hurry up, would you?’

 

You can read more of my writing via my blog, ‘Complikated’. The web address is: www.kateginnivan.com.

 

 

 

 

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