A Fond Farewell

I've been back from Australia for a month. This blog was created to share my Australian experience with you and I think it's time to close it down. I will now switch all my blog-creating-energies to my professional blog, Have Hands Will Travel.

But before I go, what have I learned from this past year?

Australia is more different and more alike the US than I expected. Culturally, they hew closer to their English roots than I expected. Tea, meat pies, humor, sports, values -- they're all more like England than the US. But when it comes to social struggles and where they will be in 20-30 years...I think we'll see more similarities with US culture.

Australia has a love/hate relationship with the US -- love what we can do for them and love that we generally like them but hate the way we can overwhelm their culture with our culture. They really do hate that.

I've said it before (to the consternation of my Australian friends) but I'm saying it again -- Australians have a borderline alcoholic society. Is everyone an alcoholic? No, but way too many people drink way too much and the general culture still isn't ready to face that head-on. So, don't ever take on an Aussie in a drinking contest!  ;)

Americans will never conquer the Australian accent. The closest we get makes us sound like Canadians. I think Aussies have a secret extra hinge in their jaw.

I love Brisbane. I know that's not a view widely shared by the rest of Australia or even large swathes of Brisbanites but it's a sweet little city and damned pleasant place to live. I miss it.

The sun is as fierce as they claim it is there. They all say it's the "hole in the ozone" which I don't think is true but I have actually felt my skin sizzle there! It's disconcerting to say the least.

Aussies really truly are more laid-back than Americans. That's not just a rumor.

I needed the last year to gain some valuable perspective on myself and some key relationships. I learned, in reflecting on those key relationships, that I was probably the one that was going to have to change.

Walking away from my life and my business for a year gave me a freedom I still carry with me. I now know that I can walk away and it will be OK.

God bless whoever invented Skype.

Even 30 days into my re-entry into the hurly-burly world of Washington DC I can hold a small oasis of calm that I didn't have before I went to Australia. I call it the "she'll be right" corner. :)

America has a natural energy and drive that is core to our identity. It has its downsides but it does define our culture and I mean that as a compliment. We are curious, we are experimenters, and we still believe we can find a solution to most problems. We may be utterly deluded in that but it's a beautiful delusion to be lost in.

Writing full-time is so much more work than I remembered it being! On the other hand, I'm still a pretty good writer.

Thank you Australia (and Jeff and Alcatel) for a beautiful year.

Thank you to each of you who kept up with me through this blog. It made a difference to know people were reading it and it warms my heart, now that I'm home, to hear people mention something they saw in the blog.

Good night.

Changed Habits: Driving

It is a question -- how many of the Australia-inspired changes in my habits and perspectives will survive my transition back to DC?

I found Queenslanders to be better drivers than Washingtonians. They did not speed nearly as much as we do and they almost (no one's perfect) always let someone change lanes in front of them, even slowing down to permit that to happen. In DC, you are on your own if you want to change lanes and good luck!

I've done a fair amount of driving since I've been back. I can be quite the speed-demon driving west on I-66 to Manassas but everywhere else I am far more likely to be driving at or below the speed limit (in the far right lane, I promise!), much to the annoyance of the lead-footers behind me.

I like this. It turns out to be much easier on my nervous system. Also, maybe I'll stop getting tickets from the speed camera in front of Gallaudet University on Sunday mornings! That would be nice too.

Thank you Queensland for making a positive change in me.

Starting Over

17 days back and I'm feeling myself falling.....

Before-Australia, my days and nights had a rhythm. Sometimes I thought that rhythm would flatten me but it was familiar, known, expected. In general, it revolved around my work.

My work is....well, it's not there. I had one client on Monday. Two more on Thursday. Only one next week. I knew it would take a while to re-build. Now I don't just "know" it, I see it on my calendar (all those blank spaces!).

I am having trouble relaxing into the open spaces. I am facing a different economic truth from pre-Australia and from in-Australia. We're not destitute, we're not broke (OK, I kinda am), and we're fine. But....

The old rhythm isn't there. Is it a matter of patience? Of course it is. Is it time to crack my knuckles (metaphorically) and engage in some active marketing? Of course it is. Is this completely normal? Sure!

It still feels weird. Very weird. Ask me again in a week, it could be a totally different story.

Re-entry. It is never exactly what you expect.

We Have Re-Entry!

Well, we're back. Despite yet more fun fun times! with American Airlines, we are back in DC. Jeff arrived July 31, I arrived August 1 (it was 1:30 am when my flight finally got here).

After 2 weeks, I'm about 95% back on US time. I still have trouble remembering what day it is. Once I start seeing clients again (later today), I think I'll get back in synch with the calendar.

The heat and humidity hit me as soon as I walked out of the airport and it was oddly welcoming. "Oh yes, I remember you!" We haven't had the insane heat of July but it's been plenty hot and humid enough.

I discovered (remembered?) on that very first day -- after I woke up -- that heat smells different here than it does in Australia. I can only presume what I was smelling was the effect of the heat on both the plant life and the building materials of Washington DC and those aren't the same as Brisbane. Again, it was oddly comforting.

I spent one particularly hot and humid day running errands, which had me outside for most of the afternoon walking all over my half of the city. I was sweating like a pro football player and, um, loving it. It's not that I particularly love sweating but I was enjoying being on my feet and being in the outdoors. I fear the Queenslanders may have converted me into a fresh air fiend!

In some ways, Australia is beginning to feel like a dream. Did that really happen? Was I really there? The coupla-thousand pictures on my hard drive gives me some reassurance it really happened. Plus, I made my first deposit this morning into my Oz Savings account, which will (if all goes as planned) get me back to Australia in about 18 months.

The things I was dreading about returning to DC are still here. My mom is overjoyed to have me back and my sisters even seem pleased with it. My housemate is working hard to engage with us. I think more conversations need to ensue. My prison-bound friend is still prison-bound and I've visited with him twice and will continue to visit weekly. His larger circle-of-support is very glad to see me back and have wrapped me into their efforts to help him with this transition.

My return to Augustana Lutheran was pure joy. We hosted an Aussie-style bbq our first Sunday back and they loved it (particularly the grad students and 20-somethings who are always up for free food).

Got my first client tonight (and she's going to be a doozy!) and two more on Thursday. Got writing time scheduled in for Wednesday and Thursday. I'm getting back into "work" mode.

And DC? Just as intense (and sometimes angry) as I remember it. Beautiful and sad at the same time. Too serious most of the time. It's....DC.

And I'm back home in it.

Big or Little?

A few more thoughts on Australia before I tell you all about getting back to the USA.

Is Australia a big country or a little country? How would you vote?

Australia is a big country! It's the 6th largest country by land mass in the world (7,686,850 square kilometers). If you took out Alaska and Hawaii, it's pretty much the same size as the continental US. In fact, it's its own continent! That's BIG.

Australia is a small country. It has 30 million people. In fact, its population density is 3 people per square kilometer (the US has 317 per sq km; Canada has 3.5 but they have even more land mass!). They are 51st in the world for population but 235th (out of 241 countries) in the world for population density. (The US has 317 per sq. km) There is a lot of open space in Australia. They have 10% of the population the US does in roughly the same land mass.

They've got fewer people than the US, Canada, and the UK (countries they often compare themselves to) but more than New Zealand (and, trust me, that matters!).

This is a conflict the Australians live with every day. That big honkin' piece o' real estate gives them a sense of massiveness, of size, of bulk. And they start to expect certain things of themselves because of the size of the land. (I wonder if Canadians have the same challenge?)

Every so often, I would overhear a conversation about how the Australian people needed to start filling out this enormous land mass (ignoring the fact that most of those wide-open spaces are desert). The thought seemed to be that it was incongruous to have so few people in so large a space. I would overhear conversations expressing frustration that this or that thing wasn't happening despite Australia being a "big" country.

On the other hand, Australians also feel their smallness too, especially when it comes to their role on the world stage. I ended up feeling that Australians are not confident that their population could defend their landmass if they had to; there just aren't enough of them. Though they have the consumer expectations of larger populations, they don't have the economy to support it because they don't have the manufacturing. So, they pay for a lot of imports. They argue about whether they truly need a national broadband program because they are so large/small.

Part of the confusion, of course, is that the word "Australia" literally refers to something large and something (relatively) small -- a landmass and a people. We are the United States but we aren't North America. Neither is Canada. The UK isn't even all of the British Isles. It's something no other country in the world has to contend with.

I can understand the confusion.

Cross That Off The List

When we came to Australia I had a few goals and I was, finally, able to tick one of them off my list this week (just in the nick of time!).

As many of you know, I have a strong aversion to snakes. Actually, more like a phobia. Moving to a country with some of the deadliest snakes in the world didn't help. On top of that, the Risby-Jones family (I am co-authoring a book with the father, Ben) likes snakes. They own two pythons (not the gigantic ones, smaller ones) and have often been visited by the big mamma-jamma pythons when they had chickens (apparently a chicken coop looks just like a McDonald's drive-thru to a big python).

My goal before I left Australia was to actually hold one of their smaller pythons (known affectionately as Billy Slater, after a Brisbane rugby player). I did it on Sunday (I also got to witness the other one pooping but that's a story for another time).



I think I had hoped that actually holding a snake (for, like, 5 minutes!) would somehow cure me of my phobia. I'm not as phobic as I once was but snakes still make me incredibly nervous.

I think I hoped I would find them oddly beautiful and fascinating. Eh.....they're not butt-ugly but they still don't awe or inspire me.

The chief problem is that I am hopelessly mammalian and they are hopelessly reptilian. We don't think alike, we don't communicate alike, we don't react to the world in a similar fashion, and their teeth are way the hell sharper than mine (and their reflexes off the charts as far as I'm concerned).

I find them inscrutable and vaguely untrustworthy. I can not imagine establishing or experiencing a "link" with them. Plus, their eyes still freak me out. I mean, really freak me out. I cannot look them in the eye. Sorta like vampires.

But It Has Been Done! I have held a snake (sorry, Charlie, but I had to). I don't know if I'll do it again but now I know I won't die from a heart attack if I have to. That's helpful. :)

The Object of Their Obsession

Back on Easter weekend, I was at a marina with Jeff, waiting to meet someone. We started talking to the woman at the next table. When she found out we were Americans, she began talking at length about her travels in the US, her observations about the US, her thoughts about race relations in the US, etc.

This just happens every now and then. Several times in the past year, we've met people who had a lot to say about the US when the found out we were Americans. Only once did it get sort of confrontational. The other times it was only clear that these people had thought a lot about the US as an international power, as a creator and exporter of cultural values, as a melting pot, as a concept, as an example (good and bad), etc.

Australians, on average, spend more time thinking about the US than you might imagine. Not all Australians and not all the time. But we are a subject of reflection, contemplation, revulsion, admiration....well, we just are a subject.

It's rare to watch TV news shows or daytime talk shows that don't mention the US at some point. All the morning news/talk shows have a segment on entertainment and it's always from the US it seems.

Does this mean Australia universally loves us and wants to be just like us? Oh, hell no! There is a lot of conflict in the relationship between Australia and the US (at least for the Australians). They believe they must maintain a buddy-buddy relationship militarily because we're the only thing that will protect them from the marauding hordes of Indonesians / Muslims / Chinese / North Koreans / villian-of-your-choice who could come swarming across their borders any minute! Yet they (like so many) are not keen about our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, especially when Diggers (the Aussie equivalent of "GI") die there.

They watch the way America has dealt with African Americans and Native Americans and wonder if we're doing a better or worse job than they are with their Aboriginal citizens. They seem a bit confused, sometimes assuming that the Aboriginal status is most like the African American status because both cultures refer to themselves as "black". In fact, the more accurate comparision would be to Native Americans.

They love shopping for American products online now that the Aussie dollar is so strong but resent that it's tough to "buy Australian" since American products often dominate.

Like to travel to the US (especially Las Vegas! Oh, how they love Las Vegas!) but get fretful if American tourism drops. They seem to attach much more value to American tourism than to European or Asian tourism, though it seems from my limited experience that Asian and European tourism is a much stronger stream. I get the impression they look at American tourism as more validating.

Love their Maccas (McDonalds) and KFC but deeply resent the intrusion of American holidays like Halloween.

There are plenty of Aussies who can blissfully go days, weeks, and possibly even months without thinking about America. But I'd bet there are very few Aussies who never think about the US. Or form an opinion about us.

The best part about living outside your own country for a while is getting an outsiders perspective on it. If you were to form an opinion of the US based solely on TV coverage and Facebook, you'd probably come to the conclusion that it's a gigantic loony bin! We are....different, very different from Australia.

Fresh Air Fiends

Picture this: it's the time of the year when the days are in the 60s and the nights are in the low 40s. You decide to go out for dinner after dark; the temps are in the high 50s. About half the restaurant's tables are inside and the other half are on the sidewalk.

Do you want a table inside or outside? If you're an Aussie, it could as easily be one as the other!

Honestly, I am continually amazed by the Aussie devotion to eating outside even when it's much chillier than the average American would ever choose for outside dining. Sure, they have those tall propane heater thingies but I've seen more than one Aussie fully done up in coat, gloves, scarf, and hat choosing the outside table.

The guy who was Jeff's predecessor on this contract (another American from the DC suburbs) mumbled darkly about being tired of eating outside when he left. I thought he was just being grumpy. Now I understand.

I finally asked the women in my meditation group about this. They, somewhat sheepishly, admitted that Australians are a little obsessed with "fresh air". They loathe being in a room without access to a window they can open. One woman admitted that when she visits her daughter in London she can only stand to leave the windows closed on the coldest of days and even then it's a struggle.

I think this may be part of why they have been reluctant to adopt some of the energy-saving construction methods that are standard in the US -- double-paned windows, insulation, etc. While these sorts of things (and the a/c and heating systems they support) are useful they also lead to "closed" buildings.

The truth is that many of us in the US rarely interact with air that isn't treated in some way (heated or cooled, humidified or de-humidified) and we go from one closed environment to another -- our sealed houses to our sealed cars to our sealed offices.

That would drive your average Aussie nuts. Sure, they have to deal with bugs, flies, etc. more than we do but they accept that these are a normal part of life. And theirs are more likely to be lethal than ours!

So if you've got Aussies coming over for dinner, you might want to open a window or two. :)

Why I Wanted To Walk Away

17 more sleeps till I step on a Qantas flight to return my well-rounded tush to Washington DC. I say that with a sigh.

I will admit that when Jeff told me about our chance to live in Australia for 6-12 months, one of the thoughts that zipped through my mind was "oh, hell yes, I'd love to walk away from a few things for a while". I bet we all have things in our life that we'd like an excuse to walk away from, even for just a little bit.

And it has been nice, I admit it. But in the last couple of weeks my DC life has resurrected itself in all its messiness, all its joys, all its pains.

Prison. A dear friend is going to prison in October for a federally-mandated minimum of five years. I received a letter from him today, handwritten since he's on the equivalent of house arrest and is not allowed access to a computer. I laid my hands on it before I read it, knowing that his hands had also touched it and it's as close as we can get right now. Handwritten letters have that power; email does not.

He's being honest about where he is and what life is about for him right now. He's also being honest about the people that have stepped up to tell him that he still matters to them, even people who were merely co-workers before. That made me cry. I intend to visit him as often as I can for these 5 or more years.

Surgery. My mom is very anxious to have surgery to replace an artificial knee that has quit working. Both her health and her age make this a difficult decision and it falls on we three daughters to, ultimately, make the decision. Surgery will be preceeded by a pile of doctors appointments (which we have to arrange and attend) and followed by up to a year of PT (which we will have to support her through, which historically has been nightmarish). If the doctors agree, it will still be a difficult decision to make and we may have to say "no", despite how desperately Mom wants it.

On top of that, both Jeff and one of my sisters also need surgery this fall.

Organizational chaos. An organization I am deeply engaged in, even 9500 miles away, is going through another spasm of change, thanks to a firing. The person fired is a friend (and someone I've come to depend on), the people doing the firing are friends, the larger community (who are divided about this) are friends. In responding to what I know of the events, I've managed to hurt some people deeply. This organization is struggling and I desperately want them to survive the challenges facing them. The chaos continues.

Disintegrating relationships. Our housemate -- with whom we own our house -- has been retreating more and more into her self for a couple of years. This last year she effectively disconnected from us, not returning our emails or letters or answering our phone calls. We had to have our mail forwarded to another friend since we discovered we couldn't rely on our housemate to keep us updated or forward our mail.

That's not the relationship we all aspired to when we decided to live together. I don't know that I have to do anything about this when I get home other than accept that it's unlikely to get better.

And, oh yeah, I need to re-build my practice.

New opportunities. Going home means also going back to some exciting stuff, professionally -- workshops, books, teaching, and new partnerships. Those all require a lot of work, planning, and organizing but I am excited about them.

There are other things that will make it good to be back home but my escape from my DC responsibilities is about to come to an end. Back to the real world...

Hey There Pilgrim

The congregation I've been attending -- St. Michael and All Angels Anglican -- has been hosting a series of travelogues by members and discussing travel as a form of pilgrimmage. We've discussed members trips to Jerusalem, Rome, and Vietnam.

Along the way, we've delineated what makes a trip more than a trip; what makes a trip a pilgrimmage? Some conclusions.

* A pilgrim travels lighter than a tourist, often choosing to leave favorite items behind.
* The trip involves "letting go" in some fashion.
* The focus is much more on the journey than the destination.
* The pilgrim must move outside of their comfort zone and journey into the new.
* The trip is to somewhere new.
* The traveler must be willing to trust strangers more than we might normally.

As I thought about this list it dawned on me that the last year has been a pilgrimmage for me. Brisbane is not normally thought of as a pilgrimmage destination but since it's about the journey rather than the destination I supposed anywhere can work if you have the right conditions.

We had to travel light. Because this was an "assignment" rather than a "relocation" we could only bring with us what we could pack in suitcases and convince American Airlines to check. We chose to leave a lot of things behind. We have been wearing the same clothes for a year. We have chosen not to buy some of the things we miss, deciding to just learn to live without them.

I had to let go of my professional life as I understood it up to the point of departure. I'd spent 10 years building my massage practice but I walked away from it. I will only know what remains to return to in a month when I open my massage doors again.

While I do like Brisbane -- a lot -- the important parts of this year have been about the changes we have gone through by being so far away from home, outside our comfort zone, into a new place and culture. That's where we've had the most challenges and that's where we've had the most fun.

Along the way, we have had many opportunities to form relationships with strangers and to trust strangers. We have not been disappointed yet.

At the end of each presentation at church we have asked the presenter "how are you different for having taken this pilgrimmage?" We've gotten some good answers. I don't know what my answers are yet. I probably won't know until I get full re-settled into my life in DC and have a chance to notice the differences.

Things I'm Gonna Do When I Get Back To DC #4

4. Eat Jeff's homemade bread.

Jeff likes to bake bread but we don't have the usual tools for it here and we didn't want to buy them for our (relatively) short time here. So we've been buying our bread from the shops, bakeries, and farmers markets. It's great that we have so many options (including bakeries) but a recent posting by a friend on Facebook about the health of store-bought bread has me looking forward to Jeff's time in our kitchen at home again.

3. Watch movies when they're released.

2. Surf the Web with impunity.

1. POPEYE'S!

The Kindest Winter

We're one day shy of the winter solstice here in Brissy. The shortest day of the year. The depths of winter. It has gotten all the way down to 40 F at night.

Yes, by the standards of most of you reading this in North America that hardly qualifies as winter. Just to emphasize how easy winter can be here in the Big B I went for a walk on Sunday and took pics of any ol' thing I found blooming...







It's also WinterFest in Brisbane. The ice rink, on this warm mid-60s Sunday, was packed. Fortunately, the line at the "fresh doughnuts" shack was short!

I'm Short

I grew up in the military. When you get close to your next move, you are referred to "short". As in, I'm getting short.

Jeff and I are definitely short. Less than 7 weeks. And it shows.

Jeff's pretty much done and seen everything he wants to here in Brisbane. He spends his spare time reading (and the man can read for hours; up to 12 hours at a time). He's got very little enthusiasm for trying anything new or doing any more exploring.

I've also got the short-timers blues. It's hard to get excited about the new, the different, the unusual. We have a list of about a half dozen things we want to see and do before we leave but our drive is becoming less....driven.

Much of my daydreaming and imagining is now about life back in DC. Building a new educational company with my partner Kitty. Seeing my mom. Returning to my fave pew at Augustana Lutheran. Scheduling clients. Eating me some Popeye's fried chicken...

I'm planning my next vacation but it'll be a driving trip to Madison WI via Montreal in September.

It was going to happen. I couldn't be 100% invested in this city, country, continent, and hemisphere right until the plane's wheels lifted and expect to be ready for US re-entry. I'm one of those people whose mind is weeks or months in the future and the weeks and months to come will happen in the US.

I'm still 5'6" but I am definitely short.

The Bathroom is....Where???

Bathrooms. Is there anything that makes us more nervous about a foreign culture?

One of my challenges here in Australia is that bathrooms are referred to as "toilets". A "bathroom" is where you actually go to take a bath. In a public place, you ask for the toilet.

Except, I can't. The word just feels too odd coming out of my mouth. The "toilet" is not the room, it's the actual device and that's, um, too personal?

Also, if you're old enough, you remember "All In The Family" with Archie Bunker (Caroll O'Connor), the patriarch with the NY accent who always called it the "terlet". When I say "toilet", I hear "terlet" in my head.

Stranger still.....many restaurants do not have a restroom (which, I suspect to an Australian ear is a room where you go to rest but I think they've gotten used to us weirdo foreigners who won't say "toilet") of their own. There may be one for the block of shops and restaurants, shared by all the businesses in that block. So, when you ask for the bathroom, you will often get directions like this:

Go out the front door and turn left.
Go past the next restaurant and you'll see an alleyway on your left.
Go down the alleyway towards the car park and you'll find the toilets back there.

And you will and they'll be perfectly lovely (no, it will not be a porta-john). However, you gotta admit, it's strange to actually have to leave the building (well, unless you're in a gas station) to find a bathroom.

There's nothing wrong with the system here. You can usually make it all the way to the bathroom without getting, say, drenched in a rainstorm. Just...odd to this American.

Things I'm Gonna Do When I Get Back To DC #3

3. Watch movies when they're released.

One of the disadvantages to being on the other side of the planet is that US-made movies often don't get here till weeks or months after they're released in the US. Given that the US is the biggest provider of movies, I often get excited about a new movie only to realize that I still have to wait a few months to see it.

The movie I'm getting excited about now is "Cowboys and Aliens" starring my favorite hunka-hunka-burning-love, Daniel Craig (with Adam Beach thrown in for some extra eye candy). Best news of all? It's being released in the US two days before I get back!!

So my plan for my first full day in the US is shaping up nicely:

1. Surf the 'net in the morning.
2. Have lunch at Popeye's.
3. Catch the matinee of "Cowboys and Aliens".
4. Grab a barstool next to Jeff at The Argonaut for dinner.

I think maybe the un-packing won't start till Tuesday...

2. Surf the Web with impunity.

1. POPEYE'S!

The Mighty Explorer?

Are you adventurous? How drawn are you to new experiences? Do you crave the comfort of the familiar or are you enticed by the unknown? When you don't know how a place or a people work are you intrigued or uncomfortable?

By the time we reach our 40s, most of us have a sense of the answer. We have enough actual experience (as opposed to our fantasies of who we'd like to be) to have a pretty good idea of what the truth is. Our time in Australia has put this question into sharp focus for Jeff and me.

Jeff enjoys travel. He enjoys visiting new places. He loves to drink beer in new places. But at the end of the day / week / month, he wants to go back to what is familiar. He wants to go home. His tolerance for "new" and "different" is lower than mine.

This Australian sojourn has been harder on him than on me. He admitted this weekend that he's "done" with Australia and is ready to go home. That's not an indictment on the country, the people, or the culture. It's an admission that he has exhausted his bandwidth for change. He yearns for the known and familiar -- his favorite barstool, the metro, and the Chesapeake Bay.

I miss the familiar too. I miss my church, my co-workers, my clients, my family. I miss the views of the mountains at a certain point on I-66 westbound. I miss kayaking on the Anacostia. And, yes, I miss American pizza and Popeye's fried chicken.

But I'm still motivated to explore and learn and experience this culture, country, and continent. There's still heaps of places I'd love to visit. I'm starting to contemplate my next visit to Australia because I can't imagine not coming back.

I'm driven by the new, the different, and by exploration. New places, new lifestyles, new ideas, new things to learn, new experiences. I can refresh with the familiar but I soon get restless for a change.

It's one of those things that makes marriage tricky. I crave one thing, Jeff craves another. We're not unique in that. It seems like the relationships that endure (sanely) are based on about 60-70% alike-ness and about 30-40% different-ness.

It means we have to have enough loose-ness, enough give in our relationship to make both of these things feasible while still walking through life mostly together. It also means there are times we're just not on the same wavelength, the same page.

I'm the explorer. I'm still enjoying the new. Doesn't mean I don't cry when I hear "Take Me Home Country Roads" on the radio though....

Things I'm Gonna Do When I Get Back To DC #2

2. Surf the Web with impunity. I am so tired of long spells (a week or more) when our wifi just doesn't work. I can connect for 3-5 minutes then it drops. I can get my e-mail account open but I can't actually get any of the e-mails open. It can't connect or it can for a few minutes or it starts to but it can't complete the connection. And forget about uploading any pics!

I've had days where I had to open and close my browser 8 - 10 times and re-boot the wifi just to read my e-mails.

1. POPEYE'S! (sing it with me now) Love that chicken from Popeye's.

Things I'm Gonna Do When I Get Back To DC

1. POPEYE'S! (sing it with me now) Love that chicken from Popeye's.

The fried chicken (commercially available, since I can't fry chicken without starting a conflagration) here in Australia is either KFC (bleeah) or an Aussie chain, Red Rooster (slightly better).

Oh, how I miss Popeye's Fried Chicken. The crunch. The grease. The salt. Don't start with me, you know you love it too. ;)

This Bag's For You

One of my New Years resolutions this year was to give blood as often as I was eligible. When I reported in to Australian Red Cross blood donor center downtown in January, they suggested I donate plasma. It takes longer (I budget 2 hours for the process from start to finish) so many people aren't willing.

Me? I got lots of time. I've been dutifully reporting downtown every two weeks since January. Well, except when they told me to take a month off to pump up my iron count (lots of red meat and leafy green veggies that month!) and when I got deferred for not having drunk enough water and when they couldn't find my regular thyroid meds in their list of approved meds....

I've been there a lot but have not always been able to part with my plasma. But I think I've got the system (and their requirements) worked out and haven't been turned away for a month at least! And you know what I learned today? The more you weigh, the more plasma you can give. I (cough)(cough) can give at the higest levels.

So there are some benefits to being....me.

The donor center downtown is clean, shiny, bright, and friendly (much more so than the donor center I go to in DC). The staff are efficient, organized, and seem to work well as a team. I get called in on time every time.

(Snack bar lady)

Best of all, they have way better snacks than the blood donor centers in the US! When you check in they hand you a form asking for your snack preference. Tea, coffee, water? Cheese, crackers? Cookies with or without filling? Need anything gluten-free? And if you're donating over lunch you can get a sandwich or a sausage roll (though I don't recommend the sausage rolls) (in general).

When you've finished your donation, you hand your form to the lady at the snack counter and she brings it out to you! How fancy is that??

If you haven't donated blood before you may not know the process.

* First, you fill out some forms.
* Second, you meet with a staff member who checks your blood pressure and iron count (via finger prick) and reviews the forms with you.
* Third, you're handed off the to staff person who actually takes your blood/plasma.
* THEN you get the snacks. Blood first, then snacks.

I was chatting with the forms / BP / finger stick lady today. She asked if I knew what plasma was good for. I'd looked that up a few months ago. It has a number of uses but it's especially useful to burn victims.

She said the true value of blood donations hadn't become real to her until her mom was diagnosed with leukemia and had to go through the usual treatments for it (successfully, thankfully). One day she was with her mom during a blood transfusion and realized that every bag they hung from the pole for her mom represented a person, a real person and a complete stranger, who had spent one or two hours of their time filling this bag that her mom needed so much. Some bags are actually a compilation of several donations so they represented several people.

These donors, of course, don't know her mom but what they did was vital to her life and health. They literally gave her a piece of their own body.

I almost cried.

It's true. I will never know who receives my plasma. Perhaps it will be used for testing and it will never meet a live person. I don't think of myself as some kind of altruistic superhero for donating. I've done it since I was 17. I don't even remember why I was moved to start donating then but I do remember that I had to get my parents' permission because I wasn't 18 yet.

But in some very concrete ways, I am a hero as is every person who donates. Someone's life literally depends on the stuff that fills that bag hanging next to me. It costs me nothing but time and I get snacks!

On 9/11 lots of people headed to donor centers to give blood and that's great. But most people who need blood products can't send out a call when they need it. Someone has to have made the trip to donate in advance of their need. The blood product needs to be sitting there just waiting for them.

And 99% of the time it will be a stranger. In the case of my donations here in Brisbane, a foreigner to boot.

Today, I feel very special for doing what I do.

Is We Are or Is We Ain't?

Heads up: this post isn't about Australia or about living in Brisbane. It's about creation and humanity and possibly God too.

So the internet is all a'buzz about the "impending Rapture" (7 hours and counting here in Australia!). Who's going, who's staying, who's partying, who's looting. I don't subscribe to the brand of Christianity that waits for a Rapture. I think the Kingdom of God is already here whenever a heart re-connects to the Divine and remembers its essential holy nature.

I was also listening to some podcasts yesterday (they're my reward for a long week of work) about creation and evolution and vegetarianism and the planet and love and all that happy hoo-hoo. I found myself reflecting on an essential conflict in the way we view our role in this creation -- are we a natural part of the creation (just like trees and the oceans and baby seals) or are we a separate thing from the natural world?

The thing that makes me sigh is this:

"Environmentalists" (at their extreme) treat humans as a parasite upon the perfection of creation. They treat humans as not an equal part of creation with everything else. They treat humans as separate from creation.

Those "humans uber alles" types (often religious, also often in the extreme) do the same thing. There's creation and then there's us standing on top of it (probably with our hands on our hips, chest out, and maybe a superhero cape a'flutter behind us), master of all, with "dominion" over everything. We and creation are two separate things, in opposition to each other.

They posssess the same worldview -- separation between creation and humanity -- for different reasons but with similar results: they're not getting anywhere productive with the rest of us.

What if -- and I know it's a stretch for some people -- we're only a part of creation? After all, we're made from the same storehouse of raw materials as the stars and dandelions and the platypus. We're just another mammal. We're not on the top, we're not on the bottom, and we're not a tick attached to the ass of Mother Nature. We're equals with all the rest of it (even the dandelions).

It's an integrated whole. We consume resources, as does every other part of creation. We kill things, as do many other parts of creation. We create waste, as do most processes. We're self-centered, as is the rest of creation (what, you think the bears are worried about the destiny of the salmon?).

Can we be permitted to love creation without hating ourselves? Can we honor ourselves without demeaning creation? Does it always have to be hierarchical -- one better, one worse; one on top, one underfoot?

If there's no God and creation occurred out of some natural explosive process, then we're a right and proper part of that. If there's a God and it's all an extension of His will and desire, then we belong here too. Either way, there's no separation.

OK, what about all the "destruction" we've wrought? We create havoc and destruction because we think we're separate from creation. Blame who you want but when you understand yourself as part of the whole, it's a lot harder to f**k it up.

But first, the two (or more) sides to the debates about creation need to quit setting humanity apart. Us and the ducks (and dirt and seaweed and and lichen) are in it together.

And that's what we need to be teaching and we need to be learning. Nothing good, productive, or useful has ever come from self-hate or self-aggrandizement. Until the two sides get there, we're not going anywhere useful.

And Now For A Completely Different Country

This past weekend was another international jaunt, to New Zealand. Jeff and I were last there in 2000 for our honeymoon. We also have friends who used to live in DC but retired back to NZ 6 years ago. He'd made it abundantly clear that he would not be pleased if I got this close to NZ and didn't make it to see him.

So, time for a hop across the Tasman Sea.

Jeff and Linda live on Waiheke Island, which is in the Auckland bay. I decided to spend a day in Auckland doing the 10-mile Coast-to-Coast walk before taking the ferry to Waiheke for 3 days with Jeff and Linda.

The C2C trail takes you across the city, passing through several parks and peaks. It's a nice idea, though I found the neighborhoods kinda dull (and empty, mid-day on a Friday). The peaks -- spent volcanoes since that's what created most of New Zealand -- were fun. Excellent views.

Sadly, I found the map put out by the Department of Conservation to be half-assed. It presumes you already know the city pretty well, which is a spurious presumption, given how many visitors Auckland gets, especially of the walking variety.

I ended up walking 7 of the 10 miles due to fatique (spent at least an hour between all my meanderings off-map) and sunset.

Waiheke was gorgeous and Linda and Jeff were superb hosts. The island is something of an artists colony (which I also dubbed "The Island of Short-Haired Women") so we spent time in several art galleries. The rest of the time was spent wandering the gorgeous countryside (and catching the finale of Masterchef New Zealand, which was a bona fide nail biter!).

I could keep going but I think I'll let the pics tell the story.

Near the beginning of the trail in Aucklands' Domain.

The trail through the Domain.

The tree at the top of rise in the Domain.

Heading up Mt. Eden.

The view towards downtown from the top of Mt. Eden.

Mt. Eden has the most clearly delineated volcanic crater on the walk. It's tough to appreciate how deep and steep it is from this pic but, trust me, it's steep and deep!

Yours truly, half-way through the hike.

More views off Mt. Eden.

Someone got whimsical with rocks on One Tree Hill.

The view from Jeff and Linda's living room. Anzac Bay.

resting in the sunset

Jeff and Linda on the beach

Saturday was a perfect day for a walk.

view from a bluff

This Dollar Used to Be Bigger

Been tracking the US dollar lately? Oy vey...

In an effort to make US exports more attractive (from what I understand) the US has been reducing the value of the dollar against foreign currencies (no idea how that works, I just know that's what I've heard).

Good for exports, bad for ex-pats.

When we were in Australia in 2009, the Aussie dollar was worth about 80 cents against the US dollar.

When we arrived last August, the Aussie dollar was worth about 90 cents against the US dollar.

Today, the Aussie dollar is worth about 1.10 against the US dollar.

Jeff is paid in US dollars into our US bank account. That means that when we transfer money from our US account to our Australian account, we get less money.

Back in August, if we transferred $1,000 from our US account, $1,111 showed up in our Aussie account, less the bank fees (I think; it's never a good idea to completely trust my math).

Now, transferring $1,000 from the US gets us ... $900 Aussie. Less the bank fees.

Ah, the joys of international finance.

There's really nothing we can do about it but sigh and continue to enjoy this time as best as we can.

For All The Single Ladies....

More thoughts on being a woman in 2011...

A Little Matzoh...

Jeff's cousin, Kathy, is visiting from Denver. We joined her at the Brisbane synogogue for the first night of Passover last night. There were about 75 people there (and as many people from Israel as from Australia it appeared). We sat next to two young women (early 20s?) from Israel who were doing some round-the-world travel.

Kathy and the mighty matzoh

They had been up at the beach last week. But, with Passover approaching, they wanted to celebrate with the Jewish community so they came down to Brisbane and volunteered in the kitchen at the synogogue.

It was wonderful to talk with them. They were the picture of groundedness, assurance, confidence, and self-awareness. They had thoughts and opinions on most everything that was discussed and could express themselves -- in English, which is not their first language -- well and clearly.

They both did their 2 years in the Israeli army as 18-years-olds and could talk intelligently about that experience, about Israel's challenges, and about women in the military in general. They were informative about gender relationships in Israel (Kathy's sister just became engaged to an Israeli man this past weekend so Kathy wanted the lowdown on Israeli men). And, yes, I had to compare them in my mind to the young women I wrote about a few weeks ago that I encountered on a city bus.

Because there was no comparison. Same age, same gender but they presented completely differently.

Why is that? Is it culture (Israel vs. Australia)? Is it life experience (university or jobs vs. military service)? Is it family? I don't know. I just hope that the future of women looks a lot more like these Israeli girls than the girls we met on the bus.

A Little Sweat....

Two weeks ago, I signed up for a "bootcamp" being run by a personal training group at the end of my street. Very cheap -- $70 for 12 weeks -- and very convenient -- end of my street at 9:30 in the morning.

Why did I do this? I've noticed in the last month or two that my arms and legs are significantly weaker than they used to be. I noticed I'm avoiding anything that requires me to get down on the floor (like tying my shoes) because it's hard to get back up. I'm also concerned that the weakness in my arms will affect my ability to return to massage when I get back to the States. My friend Angelique loves her bootcamp so I thought "what the heck".

The biggest surprise is how muchI'm enjoying myself. It's a small group -- anywhere from 2 - 7 -- of women and one trainer (a guy). The PT mixes up the exercises, keeping them short and simple. Best of all (and one of the things that kept me from considering bootcamp): no yelling.

Really, what kind of person gets motivated and excited by having a stranger yelling at you at the crack of dawn? Not me!

Yesterday we did all of our excercises in boxing gloves because one of the stations was boxing exercises. I learned that I have both more and less coordination than I thought but at least I didn't hurt myself.

At one point I looked at the woman in the room (30s - 50s I suspect) and marvelled at how comfortable we all were there, sweating and hitting and grunting. My mother was involved in weight loss and exercise efforts from her 30s on, generally unsatisfactorily. I tried to imagine my mom looking as sweaty and disheveled as we did (t-shirts and shorts, for the most part) and wearing boxing gloves and hitting the trainers padded hands as hard as she could.

Gotta say, the image didn't come.

There was a time, within my lifetime, that women just didn't sweat (well, unless they worked on a farm or as a cleaner or in a factory...OK, middle- and upper-class women didn't sweat) comfortably. In the 80s it got a little more popular as long as we were clad in colorful outfits and made it sexy.

Now it's not even a suprise to see a room of women sweating as hard as a man, hitting things, pushing their physical limits, and grunting with confidence. Believe it or not, that's a freedom, to be fully physically present in our bodies, including the messy bits. Yeah, we're still too motivated by trying to look like we're 30 when we're 40 but it's still progress.

That's happened in the course of my life, in the last 50 years. I'm glad for it. I wonder what the next 50 years will bring.

The real cost of food?

Went to the grocery store today for our weekly re-fill. It seemed that, on a per serving basis, fruit and veg are a lot more expensive than meat or grains. So I did a little calculating on our groceries.....

Per Serving, from low to high:

couscous: .43

spinach pasta: .45

canned tomatoes: .53

broccoli: .59

apples: .83

cottage cheese: .86

yogurt: 1.06

kransky's: 1.40 (an Aussie sausage Jeff has fallen in love with)

lamb chops: 1.49

grapes: 1.50

avocado: 1.75

chicken thighs: 1.90

kale: 2.12 (called silverbeet here; because it cooks down so much you have to buy a lot to get one serving)

fruit juice: 2.59

Pepsi: 3.29

So, it's not as overt as I thought standing in the check-out line but there are some surprises here. Anyone have any ideas how this would compare to prices in the US?

The Ex-Pat Marriage

When Jeff and I first started talking about living and working overseas 12 or 13 years ago, we imagined the adventure of it. We imagined being immersed in a different culture. We imagined food and sights new to us. We imagined new friends. We imagined our horizons being broadened. We imagined becoming wiser or at least more world-wise.

What we didn’t imagine was us, the real us, and how the cauldron of being uprooted would affect us.

In our normal day-to-day lives back home in DC, we are suspended, as a couple, in a robust and complex web of relationships -- brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, godchildren, parents, neighbors, co-workers, friends, his fellow sailors and my fellow Lutherans. Perhaps you envision marriage as a distinct unit set apart from other relationships. It isn’t.

Well, yes, it is in a way. The only two people that truly make a marriage work or not work are the two people in it. Yet unless those two people live a life devoid of other relationships, their marriage also happens within those other relationships.

Those other relationships feed each of us in unique ways. Those other relationships encourage us in our married-ness by the simple fact that they treat us as an emotional and logistical unit. They give us an outlet from each other when that is necessary. They laugh with us, they listen to us, they challenge us, they let us bitch and moan when we need to, and they celebrate our milestones and grieve our losses with us.

And 8 months ago we walked away from every last one of them and moved 10,000 miles away with only each other to provide that support, encouragement, etc. etc. etc. Skype, Facebook, and e-mail help maintain the connections but they aren’t anywhere near as useful as the face-to-face connections.

If you don’t think that affects a relationship, I can only say you’re wrong. All those things that other relationships provided we now expect and need each other to provide. That’s asking a lot -- a hell of a lot -- from a partnership. There is a myth that a husband/wife is really all you need in the world That the two of you against the world will stand strong, that marriage will be a bulwark against all the woes of life.

A good marriage is a profoundly valuable gift but being married these last 10+ years has also made me appreciate the limits of a good marriage (and I have one). I can’t ask Jeff to be my everything. He can’t expect me to be his everything. But, sometimes, we’re all we’ve really got here.

I’d like to tell you we have both risen to the challenge with grace, love, and imagination but, ah, if you’re reading this the odds are that you know one or the other of us (or even both of us) better than that. J We have struggled at times. Homesickness made everything harder. We yearned for missing connections and wanted the other to provide them. But I can’t be his missing sailing buddies and he can’t be my missing church friends. Just can’t.

We entered into this with a pretty solid marriage and, here’s the good news!, we’ve still got a pretty solid marriage. We’ve worked through (and continue to work through) the tricky times. As with most relationships, the tricky times served to illuminate ourselves to ourselves. I said a long time ago that the down side to really loving somebody is that it holds a mirror up to you at your worst. You see the effects of all the immature, fragile, and half-baked aspects of yourself through how they affect the one you love.

So does being an ex-pat.

An example….

I’ve got a temper. When I get pissed off, I can be a hot poker straight into your left eye. As more than one friend who’s experienced my furies has said, at least you know where you stand with me! At home, I’ve got…outlets for my anger. Or at least I can spread it around. J Here, not so much. Jeff gets the brunt of it.

I’ve been thinking about anger a lot in the last 6 months or so, after a stressful trip back to the US last September. Most of my friends are, frankly, terrified of anger, anyone’s anger. The funny thing is, so am I. So is Jeff. We respond in different ways. Yet anger is a pretty normal emotion. We all experience at some time or another. It’s…normal.

I hate to watch Jeff disconnect from me when I get angry. He does it to protect himself, naturally enough, but I hate it and I’ve got nowhere else to go with it. So I’m spending time paying attention to what makes me angry, what I need from the world around me when I get angry, what I need from Jeff and want I can honestly expect from Jeff.

I’m also going deep into my own fear of anger. If I’m not literally afraid for my physical, emotional, or psychological safety, why am I so twitchy around someone else’s anger? A friend here in Brisbane talked recently about her same struggles. She said she finally had an experience where she was able to say “his anger is not mine and it is not about me and it will not hurt me. So I do not need to be afraid.”. She said it was one of those life-changing aHA moments and she’s been able to be calm in the face of anger since then.

I want to learn that. I want to learn to not be afraid of other people’s anger. I also want to be able to recognize the validity of expressing my own anger when I am not threatening someone physically, emotionally, or psychologically (which, honestly, I rarely am).

Would I have explored myself like this if I had remained in DC? Maybe, eventually, over a long time. Here, it moves higher on my priority list because I can’t help but see the effects on someone I never ever want to hurt.

Leaving home…a mirror allowing us to see ourselves when we’d really rather not. J

The White Hair Blues

As most of you know, I dyed my hair purple as a fundraiser for the leukemia and lymphoma society of Australia. Very very deep purple. I called it "beetroot" in honor of the Australian love of that veggie.

That was about a month ago. It is fading and is now a sort of brown-ish purple (actually, not a bad color) and longer, so I think it looks a lot better.

I was having a few drinks with our neighbors last week and one of the neighbors commented quite a few times (she'd also had a few more drinks than me) that it took 10 years off my looks. As I sit here looking up into the mirror above the desk where I'm writing, I agree with her. It reminds me of my natural hair color from 20 years ago (the brownish, not the purple) and I have to admit I like it.

Which is a problem for me.

I dyed my hair full-brown for a year or two in my early 30s (I started going white in my late 20s) but gave it up. It was too much trouble and too expensive. You have to really keep on top of it and I just couldn't be bothered.

And, as I explained to my neighbor, I consider dying my hair to hide the fact that it's naturally white to be an act of deception. My hair is no longer brown. It's white in front and gray in the back.

News flash for a lot of people: that's completely normal for a 50-year-old. Completely normal. You may not realize that because the bulk of 50-year-old women who have natural gray/white hair are dying it. It's also very very common for women to start graying in their 30s. Which is when most of us start dying it.

I am also....amused by the fact that I should be flattered to be told I can pass for 40. When I was 40, I was supposed to be flattered to be told I could pass for 30. So......is it a good thing or a bad thing to look like I'm 40? Oh, right, the good thing -- for a woman -- is to look like anything but what you are. What you are is never good enough.

When you're 15, you want to pass for 20.

When you're 20, you want to pass for 25.

When you're 25....well, actually, 25 is probably the one age when it's OK to look like what you are.

When you're 30, you want to look like you're 25.

When you're 40, you want to look like you're 30.

You get the picture. And that annoys me (when I'm not finding it amusing). When is it OK to the world around me for me to be what I am -- 50? I guess to the world around me, that's never OK. Do you men get this happening to you too? My assumption is this is mostly a woman's problem.

Here's the other reason I don't dye my hair brown -- at some age, it will look comical that I still have brown hair. It will be patently false. What is that age? No woman I know can tell me but they are all sure they'll know when they get there.

I think they are fooling themselves. I can all-but guarantee that they'll all go too long, unwilling or unable to recognize that they are "there".

And how do you gracefully go from youthful-brown/black/blond/red to tastefully white? From a purely technical perspective, it's gotta be damned difficult. I've never seen it done without going through an unattractive two-tone (white roots, whatever other color on top) period. Unless you want to spend a few years experimenting with dying your way to white. Too much trouble.

So why not let nature take her course now and get it over with? My hair is white rather than gray (at least in the front, which is the only part I can see so it's mostly the only part I care about). White is prettier than gray. And I've at least been trying to adopt a persona of older and wiser to go along with it. Some days, it even works.

The fact that I'm also pretty fair-skinned doesn't help, though. The white hair looks better on those rare occasions when I've got a tan but that's pretty, well, rare. My eyebrows are also now going white. I can look pretty .... white sometimes. Occasionally kinda invisible.

So, here I sit with a hair color that's tricky to replicate, and expensive, and I like it and I'm going to go back to white because it's the truth, it's what I am (in addition to cheap and lazy). But don't be surprised if, in a year or three, I show up with it purple again. Or pink. Or blue. Or green.....

Ya Wanna Play Some FOOTBALL!?!

The biggest complaint I hear about soccer in America is that it's too slow; more specifically, no one hardly ever scores. I have the solution: Australian Rules Football.

I loves me some footy (and not just because they wear those adorable little shorts) (though I will admit that helps). It's just a great game to watch.

Imagine soccer -- the ball always in motion, possession changing every few minutes, people running, running, running -- but allow the players to use their hands. In fact, they aren't allowed to "bump" the ball with their head or their body parts. They throw it or punt it up and down the field.

Oh, yeah, and get rid of that silly goalkeeper. Wiiiiiiide open goals that are absurdly easy to get a ball through. So it's quite normal to have a score of, say, 120 - 95.

And did I mention the little shorts?

OK, that's Australian Rules Football.

Jeff and I went to see the season opener last week for the local team, the Brisbane Lions. They were playing the Freemantle Dockers (whose colors exactly matched my purple hair. Woops!). The Dockers wore the cutest striped long socks.

Ah, it's possible they wouldn't like them being called "cute"....

We went for the cheap seats -- $25 -- and were surprised that we were close to the goal and maybe a dozen rows off the playing field. I think if you're up a level you get a better view of the entire field of play (and don't get whacked in the face when a ball goes sailing into the stands) but we loved it.

The field is large and oval and play covers the entire thing. The actual size of the field is roughly 150 x 135 meters (165 x 145 yards) (it varies a bit from stadium to stadium). These guys run their legs off!

The ball looks a lot like an American football with more rounded ends. They can kick it or punt it (hit it with their hands) or toss it. I don't remember anyone doing an overhand pass like an American quarterback would do.

Forward progress is a bit like sailing into the wind: tacking left and right to eventually end up going forward.

The goal is 4 poles. You get 6 points if you get it between the center two poles. You get one point if you get it through the outer poles. The "goal refs" have these very stylized movements they do to signal the type of goal it is, which cracks me up every time. The "field reps" also have a funny way of tossing the ball back on the field when it goes out of bounds -- the stand with their backs to the field and toss it high and hard over their head.

The game has 4 quarters but they're 30 minutes each. Except the 4th quarter which often is longer than 30 minutes due to calculations I will probably never understand. So when the game is close, I don't actually know what "zero" time is (since the clocks count up rather than down). You just keep cheering.

The game we went to was a lot of fun. The Lions were 25 point underdogs, according to the bookies, but they took the lead early and kept it, except for a few minutes, through the entire game (which actually lasted about 2.5 hours). At times, they were ahead by more than 10 points.

Until the last 6 minutes. Which is when they lost the game. Aaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrgggggggghhhhhhh!

Very frustrating. They lost by 2 points. TWO POINTS. Kill me already.

Two guys got taken off with bloody faces (so, yes, it has some resemblance to rugby too). One of these guys is going to need reconstructive surgery, it turns out. Ouch!

Very physical game.

And I love it!

A Funky Afternoon

I've been hearing about the Gallery of Modern Art (GoMA) here in Brisbane, so I decided to wander over on Sunday afternoon. It's in the cultural centre on the Southbank. And I have this to say about that: what a fabulous place!

When I think of "modern art" I tend to think of things very abstract or weird or disturbing. What I found was some of that but a whole lot of creative and funky and interesting. I took the 30-minute free tour (I really need to do that more in museums) which really was a great help. We went through the main exhibit -- 21st Century: Art In The First Decade -- and the guide's talk honestly did help me understand it better.

The museum was also quite full of families with small kids (at least in part because of the big tube slide and the room full of purple balloons and the room full of finches and...well, you get the picture). I left after about an hour (lines too long) but I hope to go back for a weekday visit next week.





This last one was the only one I saw meant to be "controversial". Notice how much those look like US dollar bills? They are.

This exhibit was created by an American artist. She was upset about how American corporations doing business in South America were changing the physical environment there. Specifically, she became focused on the birds that have become (or are becoming) extinct because of, in her view, "the American dollar".

She shredded dollar bills and has re-created the literal shape of the birds and their unique nests in this exhibit.

There's Nothing Like A Girl...

Saturday night, Jeff and I went to an Australian Rules Football game. Had a great time.

Took the bus over and back. The neighborhood right next to ours is the party/bar district. The bus home was full of 'young people' -- 20-25 years old -- most of them girls. Most were decked out for a Saturday night drink/dance/hook-up marathon. Short skirts. Heaps of cleavage. Thick black eye makeup. Hair that took 1-2 hours to get it to look so artfully shaggy.

A lot of them had also gotten pre-tanked. One woman sitting next to us was guzzling a can of Smirnoff Ice (oooh, vodka in a can!). When she finished it, she very carefully smashed it down between the seats.

The sound on the bus was roughly similar to being locked in a hen house full of chickens...and one hungry fox. That volume, that pitch. The silence was almost deafening when they all got off at the same stop.

As the vodka-sucking woman next to me got ready to get off the bus, I asked her to hand me her can. She looked at me with shock and confusion. The impression I had was that she was so focused on her night ahead, she had filtered out anything that wasn't related to it. She had definitely filtered out the purple-haired middle-aged woman standing next to her; effectively, I didn't exist.

She just....gawped when I asked for the can. I had to ask twice and then explain that I was going to find a trash bin and throw it out for her. She finally dug out the can and handed it to me.

I posted something on Facebook about the experience and, sadly but not surprisingly, the first response was "jealous??". (sigh) That speaks volumes about my "friend". It also invites me to reflect on what it means to be female today.

Jealousy. The assumption, I presume, is that the poster figured they were all "cute" and perky and I, in my middle years, am not. The assumption, I presume, is that I would give my left arm to be 20-something-cute-n-perky again.

I'll admit I'd love to weigh 10 (or 30) kilos less. But what I really don't want to be again is 20-something.

Do you really remember being 20-something? High school and/or college may have been difficult but that was nothing compared to learning to live on your own income and sharing an apartment and trying to find a job and/or launching a career with no idea how it would turn out or what you'd really gotten yourself into.

I remember having to fit into a "grown up" workplace while secretly not being sure how to do that. Being hyper-conscious about whether I was being taken seriously and thinking at the same time that everyone was taking everything too seriously.

I remember never having enough money for all the things and experiences I was "supposed" to have when it seemed like everyone else had enough. I remember wracking up debt, not aware that so was everyone else.

I remember "adulthood" not being quite the freedom-fest I presumed it would be.

I also remember the intense pressure -- biologically and socially -- to mate, to find a partner, to secure the attention of men. I remember how much of my time and energy was sucked up in that vortex of looking and being looked at. Not sure what I was looking for (because that would have required me to have a pretty clear sense of who I was) but looking desperately nonetheless.

So a lot of energy -- way too freakin' much energy -- went in to "do I look right/hot/good enough"? Do I look better than her? Do I look like the ads/the TV? Am I attracting attention? Then not being entirely sure how to handle any attention I got!

I knew I wanted sex but I was unwilling and unable to admit that what I really wanted was intimacy, connection, relationship. I presumed sex would get me that. I had a lot -- a whole lot -- to learn about intimacy.

So, would I want to go back to being a 22-year-old? Hell no!

It's not easy being a woman and it's even harder to be a young woman. The simple truth is that our bodies are treated by your culture and mine as commodities. Our parts are used to buy and sell everything from toothpaste to trucks. Our breasts, our hair, our abdomens, our legs, our butts are all used to attract attention and convince the consumer -- men and women alike -- to part with their cash.

We receive dozens of messages a day about how our bodies are supposed to look -- the magazines in the 7-11 or the grocery store, billboards, TV ads, songs on the radio, newspaper ads and newspaper articles, internet ads and promotions -- it's everywhere. Virtually none of those messages have anything to do with the reality of being a female homo sapiens but everything to do with our bodies as selling devices.

Live up to the standards and we are admired and applauded. Fail to live up and we are chastised, "encouraged" -- strongly -- to change, or ignored.

It's hard enough to deal with that some days as a grown woman who has put a massive amount of time and attention into developing my own center, my own solid sense of self, my own strength, and a clear eye for the bullshit of the advertising world. How can a 20-something cope?

Many of them cope by becoming more like their peers, the boys. Their definition of "strength" is to be just as coarse, just as profane, just as callous and pseudo-hip as the average 20-year-old guy. With (some) apologies to guys, making a 20-year-old guy your role model is not a step up to me. I do know 20-year-old guys that I respect but, on the whole, I find most 20-year-old guys, ah......well......let's just say I'm looking forward to the day when they're no longer 20-year-old guys.

When I was 20-something, the profanity/coarseness/promisciuity did not seem to be so omnipresent. Maybe it's an evolution. I hope it is just a phase and we, as women, keep evolving. Wherever "there" is, we aren't "there" yet.