Wednesday, February 01, 2012

Wake up call

Last night I wrote a whole bunch of crap on my blog which was based on a theme of Memento mori, which is the idea that we must face our death every day, get used to the idea that we aren't going to live forever and get comfortable with the simplest of facts... This is a temporary arrangement! This concept is stressed pretty heavily in an audio book I've been listening to and has influenced my thinking lately. There is nothing morbid about this practice it is actually liberating and can give us freedom from that great fear so that we can actually get on with living! It is nothing to do with having a fixation on death.

Anyway mostly the post was pure crap! I bleated on about not having enough time etc... but the post included a some stuff about a situation with some drunks outside where I work. The situation was nothing new but for some reason last night I decided to write about it. This morning I received a call and was advised not to come to work. Someone had been killed last night, right on our doorstep! Literally at the front door of the office!
I haven't heard the details of the incident yet but the coincidence was far too much for me and I decided to delete a huge portion of last nights blog post.

The situation is tragic and it is horrendous! People are getting seriously hurt all the time. Booze, Gunja, abuse of every kind is constantly there right beneath our noses but it is all happening amongst the highly visible yet some how unseen, and untouchables. Aboriginal people who live rough on our streets! Somehow so much suffering is being ignored in our town simply because it's happening to 'Them'! We've created a whole language around exclusion of indigenous people so that injustices can quickly be ignored on the vaguest of assumptions. "It was just a Longrasser", or "The bar is known for serving Itinerants" etc... etc... As soon as these terms are used it's like a verbal vito of human rights and some other bizarre social policy is enacted! It's all Bullshit! But so long as the streets are clean when Obama or some other important person rolls through town then we can happily get on with ignoring the squalor that many of our citizens are living in! It's crap!

As my Bosnian Friend Mr Alex used to say.... "Laif iz SHEET!".  Alex was a fella I lived with for a while. He rented me his apartment but camped on the couch... and smoked day and night! Alex survived the Bosnian War at the expense of his sanity! I reckon being Black On the grog, and in the Longgrass can't be much fun either!

I haven't heard yet who the man was, that died there yesterday... It could have been any of the regulars that I chat with on my way into the office. I can't imagine there was any good reason for him to die.Sometimes Life is Shit!

Today I took the family down to Adelaide River to see the Jumping Crocks! I'm trying to drop all my moral objections and this is one of them. After 15 years without paying to see people encourage crocks to come looking for meat in a boat I have finally given in! What the hell! Who wouldn't want to see one of these glorious creatures lunge out of the water and take hold of a chunk of flesh! This fits in really well with my current attitude of contemplating my death... After all... That chunk of pig meat could be... ME!
The cruise was part of a birthday present for Sam but we all had a good time finding out up close why momy doesn't like us to go swimming in creeks! Happy Birthday Darling. I hope you liked the cruise. I found it exhilarating!
 

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Old Stumpy



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GLAD TO BE ALIVE!

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