ARTICLE IN THE HERALD

I never did quite manage to work out how to upload the last article in the Herald onto the blog, but lucky for us all, my trusty graphic designer friend has put it up on the website.  You can find it under the 'news' tab.  Very exciting indeed!  Have a great weekend blogees.

AISLE NUMBER THREE

I have just returned from a lovely trip to the supermarket. 

Not possible you say.  I would have thought so too. 

When I lived in New York it seemed normal to buy your coffee and milk at two o’clock in the morning and do your laundry just before the sun got up, (there was a little beer garden out the back and a sign requesting you remove all bullets before placing your clothes in the machine) but that doesn’t appear to be the norm in old Sydney town. 

The closest to it I can get is a spin through Woolies at midnight and let me tell you, what a joyous shopping experience it is. 

You see, I get horribly distracted in a supermarket.  By the selection of lettuces and the variety of jams, by the babies screaming and the mothers joining in.  By the old men leaning on their trolleys because they’re too old to hold themselves up, and the barefoot uni students buying a loaf of white bread and a packet of skinny sausages.  By the horrible music they play that always manages to sound like a Christmas tune, by the Nutella spill in aisle three, by the choice of eggs (which took me a while to locate in the first place because in the US you’ll find them in the fridge) when all I want is an un-hormoned, happy hen that lays its eggs in a little straw nest and an old lady called Marge collects them every morning, pulls off the feathers, wipes off the poo and sends them off to the supermarket for people like me to buy.  By the number of items the deli calls sliced meats, by the frozen peas and my eternal debate about whether the name brand is of lower quality.  (They aren’t, I don’t believe, and I keep a packet handy in the freezer to mix with a mashed potato or put on a swollen post-knee run). 

By the time I get back to the checkout, I’ve forgotten half the things I actually needed (milk, oranges and peanut butter – absolute staples in my diet) but do have three different boxes of crackers, (something wheaty, something foreign and the standard box of Jatz) half a dozen fresh figs the price of which I gag at when the checkout person weighs them, and dryer sheets even though we don’t have a dryer.

Not the case at eleven thirty at night, with half an hour to go till they close, and the only thing to worry about is running over the deodorants left waiting to be stacked in the toiletries aisle.  There is no irritating music, no distraught youngsters, no one parking their cart sideways while they read the ingredients on every tin of Campbell’s soup, no overwhelming smell of all day cooking barbequed chicken, no kamikaze grapes to dodge in the produce section. 

I can take my time in the cereal aisle (I have been known to live on breakfast alone and take the buying of such an item very seriously indeed) carefully reading the ratio of fibre to potassium though I don’t know how much I need of either anyway.  I wander down the miscellaneous aisle filled with tea strainers, pencils and paper plates and wonder – again – why I didn’t skip it.   

I actually read my list of essential purchases and have the patience what’s more to seek them out.

It’s me, the nighttime stackers, some lady in an aubergine dressing gown and a bloke buying enough cigarettes to supply a small village.

Peaceful, polite, late night shopping.  No queues, no madness, no nonsense.

And I tell you, my groceries taste all the sweeter for it.

Article in today's Herald!

If any of you get Saturday's Sydney Morning Herald, take a look in the careers section.  I know, not a spot you'd think to find me in, but have a read of this week's 'the office'.  It's written by yours truly!
I can't seem to find the online link unfortunately, but i'll keep looking!

A WAR OF ATTRITION

Today was not a good day in the life of Naomi.  The literary agent rejected me.  Nicely, but rejected me just the same.  The rejection came with a very helpful critique of my work and a tag in an email that said she thinks I am a talented writer of humour. 

And that, friends, is unfortunately enough to keep me keeping on.  Those few words are enough to encourage me to get back to the computer and try again.  That’s the problem with artists.  No matter how well aware we are of the realities of our profession, and how dreadful the odds of making our passion our career, every time we submit our work, or ourselves, there is a part of us that genuinely believes we’re going to get it.  Otherwise, why would you do it in the first place?  How could you do it in the first place?  Would you go for a job in HR if you really didn’t think you had a snowball’s chance in hell of getting it?  Probably not. 

And it’s that (so far) unyielding sense of optimism that won’t allow me to quit and find an easier path to take.  Don’t think I haven’t tried to talk myself into a full time career as a long distance truck driver, (though I have serious case of driving narcolepsy so that’s perhaps not the best choice) but there is nothing else I want to do. 

Just sing and write. 

And until that optimism, that belief in myself that somehow, someday I will make it all work, fails me, I’ll still be here, blogging and submitting, writing and editing, singing and dreaming…and running.  Because this is what I thought about while I pounded around the edge of our beautiful harbour and tried to cheer myself up. 

You put yourself in this mess Hart, so you can find a way out of it.

This is a war of attrition.  If I hang in here long enough, one day I will win.

GREGORYITIS

So I didn’t go to yoga.  I needed to run.  These last couple of weeks I’ve had a bit of Gregoryitis.  I miss my husband.  Just once it would be nice to have more than twelve minutes a day with him.  Maybe even have dinner together, watch a movie, go for a walk, talk.  You can see what type of mood I am in and ninety minutes of someone telling me that ‘this is today’s journey, just embrace it’ while I’m desperately trying to reach behind me and grab my left heel with my right elbow just wasn’t going to cut it. 

And so I ran...terribly.  Butch our thirteen-year-old dog could have done a better job.  But you know, with running and me, that’s just not the point.  Sure it wasn’t a run to be proud of, but it did clear my head, I wrote the start and middle of two new stories and had an imaginary conversation with my husband on our perfect night out.  This is why I run.  And this is why nothing else will suffice.  Dancing is glorious and it makes me feel free, swimming is methodical and fun for a change, walking is for old people and yoga for those who’s zen is far easier to locate than mine.  But running, running eases my soul.  

And now I can go to teaching without taking my gregoryitis out on my students.  And that, is a good thing to be sure.

WITHDRAWAL...

How many kilometres is it from Town Hall station up to the Mint building for coffee, through the park to the art gallery, through the Archibald Exhibition, out to the café for lunch, back through the Art Express Exhibition, back across the park down to the bus station and home?  Because that’s what I did instead of running today.  I talked about running if that counts.  On national radio no less.  You can hear it if you like. And since today was such a lovely, low-key, hang out with my mother and cousin, look at art sunshiney day, I didn’t need to run as much as I normally do.  I’m a little antsy and taking the dog for a walk hasn’t quite cured it, but sometimes I wonder, if just like someone on long-term prescription medication often tries to reduce their dose, if that’s not a bad idea for me.  Am I too reliant on running for my sense of wellbeing?  Without it am I difficult and withdrawn because I haven’t had a chance to process the day’s incidents?  Do I find it difficult to relax if I haven’t worn myself out?  The answer to all these questions is unreservedly yes, but I’m not sure that’s healthy.  So, unadvised by any medical professional, I have forced a reduction in medication by not running today and deciding to yoga instead tomorrow.

This could be interesting folks, I’ll let you know how I (and anyone around me) fairs.  

POCKET SIZED POOCHES

Is it just me, or has the number of breeds of small dogs in Australia increased dramatically during my absence over the last seven years?  I don’t mind the occasional game of dodge the dog, but the smaller they are, the bigger the problem.  They’re harder to see, they dart rather than trot, their movements are unpredictable and they are NEVER ON A LEAD!!!!!!!!!!!!  I appreciate giving dogs their freedom – I would try with ours but he has no street skills and we live just off a major arterial road.  He would be free all right.  Or his spirit would be, as he took up his place in doggie heaven.

All I mean to say is, sometimes it’s a little frustrating to have to hop, skip, cartwheel, gallop and levitate to avoid squashing a dog the size of my sneaker under my pounding heel.  Truly this is not a rant against dogs, or dog owners, I am one and a lover of both.  But it’s a bit like when people are strung out all along the footpath and the person directly in your way refuses to move over to allow you passage despite the fact that footpaths are, as far as I’m aware, a two way street.  Dogs don’t speak English, so I don’t expect them to understand.  But presumably their owners do.  Does it not occur to them that their untethered midget canine is actually rather a nuisance?  If the situation were reversed and I was blithely allowing my pet duck to wander at will across a path, would they not find themselves frustrated?

Don’t worry, I didn’t let this issue with the vertically challenged pooch ruin my run, and it was a glorious one in the warm, fading autumn sun.  Owing to my article in today's Sydney Morning Herald, I had skipped Yoga out of fear that someone would recognize my name when I checked in to take class, but will be back again tomorrow.  I don’t normally do this many yoga classes in a week, but the tight arse in me is lured by the flat rate they offer you for the first seventeen days.  I guess they hope you’ll develop a yoga-addiction, but for me it’s purely mathematics.  This is a good deal and I’m going to exploit it.