NYE 2002 North Rd Reservoir
NYE 2002 North Rd Reservoir I fell in love for the first time.
We were the only same sex couple at school. It didn’t feel like a big deal at the time, I was on cloud 9, looking back, it was a big deal.
Our friends were amazing… we had this big posse of ultra nerdy girls, they protected us from any homophonic backlash (with the exception of her stepfather).
We stayed up all night, we wrote love letters, we whispered our favourite Ani lyrics to each other at school.
Two years later we went to our formal.
She was into LAMB and I was into Gillian & Dave so it didn’t last. But it was my first time, it was a good and very special time, and I feel so grateful for that.
In the words of Ani…
I remember where I was standing
I remember how it felt.
We were the only same sex couple at school. It didn’t feel like a big deal at the time, I was on cloud 9, looking back, it was a big deal.
Our friends were amazing… we had this big posse of ultra nerdy girls, they protected us from any homophonic backlash (with the exception of her stepfather).
We stayed up all night, we wrote love letters, we whispered our favourite Ani lyrics to each other at school.
Two years later we went to our formal.
She was into LAMB and I was into Gillian & Dave so it didn’t last. But it was my first time, it was a good and very special time, and I feel so grateful for that.
In the words of Ani…
I remember where I was standing
I remember how it felt.
Sept 2004 Darebin Arts Car Park
Sept 2004, I feel in love in this car park. She was a million years older, but really it was only four. She lived with her ex-partner on Roseberry Ave Preston. I gave her a mix tape that made it blindingly obvious how infatuated I was, but I was so young I still thought I was being cryptic. I would walk up to Preston and back hoping to run into her. I didn’t have a mobile phone back then.
After I turned 18 she eventually invited me out for a drink, somehow, maybe on the landline!? I knew she was gonna say there was something happening between us, I was absolutely freaking beside myself with excitement. I tried speaking to my mother about what I should do and she told me I should lie and say I didn’t feel anything towards her (god knows why 🙄🤯).
It was the wrong advice, it went against everything I was feeling. By the time we got together I had been to the bottom point of having anorexia and had severe anxiety (straying yourself makes you quite anxious if you didn’t know).
I was going to say that the relationship didn’t work because ‘I was still a child, and she was a lady…She wanted to live together and do all the adult things, and I just wasn’t there yet’… but I guess the truth is that I was still very sick.
I didn’t know I was sick.
I didn’t actually stop being sick with anorexia until 2009 when my friend Les taught me to kayak.
It gave me a positive relationship with my body again, I felt strong. I felt good.
There’s only been one relapse for me since then. Port Fairy Folk Festival 2016.I felt so uncomfortable with the thought of ppl taking photos of me and them being published on the net that I started restricting my eating again.
It was bad. But it’s nice to express. Probably no one gonna get this far down in my rant. I think I’m leaving these two memories here in the feed for my kids. Least they’re written down somewhere as a time capsule.
Merri Creek Bike Path
I remember the wobble of the bike seat as my father would ride this path… you know, those ones that suspend over the back wheel and never feel secure. We’d ride to Brunswick velodrome and back, excited by the speed but nervous we’d somehow end up in the Merri Creek.
Years later I would sneak over Arthurton Rd to the industrial estate with some other kids from my street, through a broken fence and onto to the embankment that overlooked this creek path… we went to throw rocks across on creek to scare the cyclists 🤯 I know right, What The Hell!?! I did that?
I might have been 11 or 12.
We weren’t attempting to hit anyone, just wanted to get a rise outta people 😬 Bad, bad, bad. So bad.
The things you try on when you’re out of your parents sight.
Someone threw a rock, I can’t remember if it hit the guy but he stopped and started swearing at us across the creek. It was all gusto and bravado, kids laughing and yelling things back. We couldn’t actually see the guy through the trees etc so it was just a voice… then five minutes later we heard him looming over the road above the embankment yelling blue murder at us… we totally packed it.
Ran away somehow, I don’t even remember.
I think that was the second and last time we tried this rock throwing club.
After I finished Year 12 exams I had nothing to do. No job, no drivers license, no real tangible adult skills, so I would ride up the creek to the Velodrome and back, outta the saddle the whole way just for kicks. It felt super tough at the time but I just google maps-ed the ride it was only 3.2km round trip 😂
Seems pretty lame by my current standards of hauling 50kg of trailer + toddlers around the joint! Ha
Years later I would sneak over Arthurton Rd to the industrial estate with some other kids from my street, through a broken fence and onto to the embankment that overlooked this creek path… we went to throw rocks across on creek to scare the cyclists 🤯 I know right, What The Hell!?! I did that?
I might have been 11 or 12.
We weren’t attempting to hit anyone, just wanted to get a rise outta people 😬 Bad, bad, bad. So bad.
The things you try on when you’re out of your parents sight.
Someone threw a rock, I can’t remember if it hit the guy but he stopped and started swearing at us across the creek. It was all gusto and bravado, kids laughing and yelling things back. We couldn’t actually see the guy through the trees etc so it was just a voice… then five minutes later we heard him looming over the road above the embankment yelling blue murder at us… we totally packed it.
Ran away somehow, I don’t even remember.
I think that was the second and last time we tried this rock throwing club.
After I finished Year 12 exams I had nothing to do. No job, no drivers license, no real tangible adult skills, so I would ride up the creek to the Velodrome and back, outta the saddle the whole way just for kicks. It felt super tough at the time but I just google maps-ed the ride it was only 3.2km round trip 😂
Seems pretty lame by my current standards of hauling 50kg of trailer + toddlers around the joint! Ha
School Number 1108 - Thornbury
Slept in this doorway once. Years later we moved to this same Thornbury St.
Our neighbours were ice addicts and got busted in a sting op for 39 accounts of armed robbery. I still remember the excitement of seeing the street crawling with cops one morning we were leaving on tour.
Now, this corner is next to a hip music venue. Who’d have thought, dark dodgy Thornbury would produce such a thriving (legal) night life … oh the days of Bender Bar, when living on this street was living at the arse end of the musical universe.
Now I live in Deep Reservoir, beyond the edge of the known world… and yesterday, after almost 9 years, I nailed a picture hook into the wall of our house for the first time.
Like Courtney says, things take time, take time.
Our neighbours were ice addicts and got busted in a sting op for 39 accounts of armed robbery. I still remember the excitement of seeing the street crawling with cops one morning we were leaving on tour.
Now, this corner is next to a hip music venue. Who’d have thought, dark dodgy Thornbury would produce such a thriving (legal) night life … oh the days of Bender Bar, when living on this street was living at the arse end of the musical universe.
Now I live in Deep Reservoir, beyond the edge of the known world… and yesterday, after almost 9 years, I nailed a picture hook into the wall of our house for the first time.
Like Courtney says, things take time, take time.