Flipping the chart

Last week I started jogging and attempted to swim a few laps at the pool. 

Realizing that I am grossly unfit I am just trying to build from a very low base. No major acts of bravery or bravado. The mission is to consistently have a go and trust that time and effort will result in improvement.

I had the boss's car all week so took advantage of the opportunity and drove to Nightcliff instead of riding my bike.

Each day from Monday to Friday I jogged very short circuit of about three or four kilometers which brought me back to the pool where I have begun the arduous mission of swimming laps. 

I haven't achieved anything miraculous but have managed to keep up the routine and have slightly increased my distance both on land and in the pool.

On Saturday I was caught out. The pool wasn't due to open until 8am! So I took that as a sign that I could goof off. I went straight to the shop and got myself a cup of coffee and a strawberry doughnut. Yum!

As I was enjoying my justified break, rather than journalling if flicked to my phone and the notorious facebook, where I saw that the Nightcliff Parkrun was scheduled to commence in half an hour... Normally this wouldn't bother me much but recently I've had a notion in my head to say yes to all reasonable propositions... This was within the boundary of 'reasonable'! (I've also made an agreement with myself to be rigorously honest!). There was nothing I could do to avoid the run. According to my new standards for living, the activity was locked in!

The run was scheduled to commence at 7:00am. I was there on time.

 I've never done a Parkrun but figured it would be a gentle way to ease into running with a group. I didn't really know what the deal was, how it was organized but I knew that it'd be easy to join in. It's just a bunch of people running together. So I jumped in somewhere toward the front of the mob and when they said go I followed the leaders.

I just tried to jog like I always do and stick with a group I could keep up with. Of course there were some super fit runners who took the lead and never dropped their pace, but most of the people running were doing a pace I could manage. I stuck with a group of guys who were pretty fit but not pushing too hard. 

As the crowd spread out I found that I was still relatively close to the front of the pack. (Bear in mind there were all kinds of people running, of all ages and abilities, there were several people pushing prams!) By the time we reached the first turn I was feeling pretty puffed, but I looked around and saw that most of the others were too. I decided to run behind a big guy, who looked like an add for the army hand to hand combat brigade. I chose him because I figured I could draft behind his mass and because he was wearing a vest full of weights... So it was kind of like he had a fair handicap. It gave me a psychological advantage over my desire to quit. Keeping pace with a fit young guy boosted my ego enough to keep me tagging along, knowing he was carrying a shit load of extra weight reassured me that he must be struggling nearly as much as me. (It worked!)

I thought I was coming to the finish line but saw the leaders heading over the Rapid Creek bridge... WTF! Do I have to keep going? I tried to stay cool as I passed the photographer and marshals, I even gave a bit of a grin and a skip but it was all bluff... as soon as I was out of their sight I walked! At this point I expected a bunch of people to come charging past me but when I looked around there was no one there. Everyone was flagging. (Except the serious joggers in front of me) I soon had my breath  back and decided to keep running. I made it to the  finish line in a reasonable state and was only passed by about three people. 

They gave me a tag that had No.00033. I had no idea what it was for so I took it to the marshal who was keeping notes. Apparently they have a way of timing everyone. I couldn't receive a time because I hadn't registered, didn't even know how. So the lady took my barcoded tag off me and told me I should register next time... "OK".

It took me a while to cool down and to regulate my breathing, I was absolutely covered in sweat but I felt awesome! After just one week of fairly mediocre attempts to go jogging, I had completed my first fun run!

I celebrated with a cold shower and a couple of laps of the pool! 

Before I turned 50 I was in a very low place. I was beginning to feel that my life was on the cusp of ending. I was not satisfied with that outcome so made a concerted effort to change, everything. Some of the changes have been very difficult, others are a mixture of bliss and agony. But bit by bit I am feeling life, and a lust for life return to my being that is craving more! I just have to say yes!

TOOTH

TOOTH
(consideration for a new year)

A tooth for a tooth, or a ticket for the bus,
The clock ticks, as it meters time
Potential by fractions is lost to indecision
Jim Morison said...
Well that's not the point
20 years today, since a precious reprieve...
I have lived... I Live! Something must always die
The second 'law' of thermodynamics is not always implied but inertia demands a  cost
Loss is not negotiable, death inevitable, debts - ultimately - payable

Life change must claim a fee a token, or ticket... Yesterday I gave a tooth
Skillfully Wrenched from my aching jaw, in three pieces.
On this auspicious anniversary, and end to an end and a tooth only to pay
Lightning doesn't always strike no matter what you pray
Was the price higher than I thought?
An old champion, my hero, tripped along the way before he'd reached his final goal

In our original glory, was there ever anything so precious as a good set of teeth?
I concede this bad tooth a toll
I trade another crevice a space in my jaw for, one more chapter in patched up shoes 
Thoughts skip to friends who never made it, They departed with all their mouths in tact,
Their future was set they couldn't change it, life's sweet breath squandered and wasted
Let the tooth burn! As fuel for this change in direction
Leave the ashes to the wind

When fate looks in this mouth full of empty spaces, It will find there within
Enough teeth remain to chew and bite and grin
Till my last jagged peg and I've breath left to shout
The marrow will be sucked before I am out!

Walking in Melbourne

A rough outline of city walk 10/06/13

Being stuck in Melbourne, unable to drive and worse still forbidden from riding a bike I have been desperate for some kind of physical activity. It's taken me nearly two weeks to feel OK about doing anything at all but rest will only get you so far! At some point the body must have movement in order to recover!

A long time friend of the family likes walking so I asked if he'd bring me next time he goes... I thought we'd be bush walking so when he called he told me to meet him at Jolimont station at 10:30am...  for a city walk I was a little surprised.

Well beggars can't be choosers! I rode the train to Jolimont Station, hopped off facing the gates of the MCG.
We walked Fitzroy Gardens and up to the Queen Victoria Markets, which are very much the same as they have always been... crowded and full of tourists. My favorite spot at the market is the Deli. Back in the good old days the Queen Vic Market was about the only place you could find European style food... (Very exotic back in the 1970s and even the 80s) a lot has changed in Australia since I was a kid, I remember when spagetti was considered foreign food.

My friend is German, he does this walk fairly regularly, the first part of the walk includes stopping at the Vic Market for a Weisswurst sausage with sauerkraut. We arrived at the vendor and 'D' walks through a throng of Chinese tourists straight to the serving area, as he orders I realize the throng was actually a queue and he had jumped it! Funny thing was that the 20 odd Chinese were all so preoccupied texting, tweeting and god knows what else they didn't even notice. I was in no mood to queue half an hour for a sausage so I kept quiet. (It was delicious by the way)

We wandered around the market for a little while but it was all so predictable and crowded! We wanted jam donuts but gave up on this idea when we saw the line of people waiting! Hot jam donuts are a real Melbourne treat but who the hell wants to stand an hour in the cold waiting for one! This is something I just don't get. There were enough customers to keep at least 3 maybe even four donut vans busy all day but there seemed to be only one donut vendor in the whole market! Someone's got this market thing all stitched up!

Leaving the market we walked down to South Bank where 100s of Yuppies enjoyed their Sunday Lunch, then crossing St Kilda Rd we walked up past the Shrine of Remembrance and through the Botanical Gardens. The gardens made news recently when a bunch of vandals got into the succulent garden and chopped up all the tall cactus trees with a machete or something. Some of the plants were 30 years old! We didn't bother gawking at the damaged plants but wandered around the various paths and checked out the ponds where I was glad to see eels had returned after the drought.

From the Gardens we crossed the Yarra and wandered back through the sporting grounds, Enormous new stadiums for soccer and tennis, then back down to the river walk where the rail-yards have been converted into parkland. I couldn't believe how Melbourne has changed since I was I kid. These were the seediest, grittiest corners of the city. Places I used to wander around, amongst the true drunken underbelly of Melbourne. The parks and gardens were once the domain of gutter drunks and hobos. I used to wag school and bring my stash down here to drink... now it's all cleaned up. Families ride bikes and have picnics, there's a children's art centre in one of the old red brick track switching houses where drunks used to sleep. Trees have been planted, grass, sculptures everything has changed... It was fascinating and very pleasant to see.

Strong Men performing at Federation Square opposite Flinders St Station

By now my back was aching... I'd slowed down a lot but was still enjoying the walk. We climbed the steps from the Yarra trail and entered federation square. An undulating cobbled surface spread out like a natural landscape on the site which was once a bland concrete rooftop! There were thousands of people in the city all eating drinking and having fun. The dark and dreary miserably empty city has gone, now the city is full of life on the weekends.

Finally we made it to a coffee shop in China town, enjoyed a reasonable brew and a Danish before heading back to Flinder's St station for the train home. Total distance walked would have been about 15 km. Finally a day out for me. Mum and Dad are completely over having me pacing the house like a caged animal.

Tomorrow I go back to the Hospital for surgery on my gimpy hand. I have two fractured bones in my wrist that are not knitting properly and have to be re-set! Damn! Still no idea about the status of my back but at least my bowel is starting to work again... nothing like a long walk to sort that out.

Just burst the bubble!

Not sure where to start this post but today I determined that I would write something.


To begin with the dry season is here! Yes.... The mood is shifting as that feeling like Spring fever takes over and the body and soul bristle with anxious energy and anticipation of moving into an exciting season.

A combination of the change of seasons, a series of profound coincidences (I can't elaborate it would ruin the whole experience!) and a desperate desire to shift gear and direction have allowed me to Burst a Bubble that I had been shrouded in for several YEARS!

Various domestic responsibilities coupled with my insatiable desire to explore, wander and drift had caused me to spend too many evenings living vicariously via the virtual world of the Internet!

I've discovered a lot of great stuff in here and found ways to take part and even contribute. There is so much information, entertainments and distractions but ultimately it's not a real life! Actually I think the 'net' result has only been to piss my wife off and make me crave a real life even more... not to mention the amount of sleep I've lost!

Now since I'm writing in this internet blog it's obvious that I am not giving it away completely! But I have decided to quit browsing and drop all superfluous subscriptions. I have explored the social networking gig and found it extremely unsatisfying... Just like mainstream media these things appear only to create status anxiety and take up valuable time that could be spent far more creatively!

Did you know that when you shut down your Facebook account the spying little creep of a thing presents you with a list of your closest friends who will miss you when you're gone! Ha! Not Bloody Likely! Actually if you want to know how many 'friends' you have shut down your Facebook and see who calls you to see what's up.... (If the phone doesn't ring, don't worry it just means that you are free to follow your dreams without the hindrance of unnecessary cometary)

Now that the dry is here we are spending heaps more time outside. I've fallen back into my old habit of going to bed before midnight and rising before dawn! The mornings have been awesome! We've managed to go on some great little rides around Casuarina Coastal reserve with the kids. Parks, playgrounds and even blowing bubbles in the back yard!

(bubbles! Try it it's FUN!)

Cycling in the dry is much the wetter more humid months!I arrive at work dry and fresh and there are heaps more bikes on the road but the head winds tend to make the trip home a bit slower. I'm not complaining! Even though the Long Bike needs a major overhaul I can't bear not riding it to work every day so will postpone the fix up for another month!

Like I said in the previous post I have dragged a rusty old project from the tangle of vines in the back yard. The poles and U-bolts I pulled from our old trampoline have sufficed as a temporary fix until I find the right size tubing that I can bolt to the frame. I'd love to have the time, space and gear to fix it right up but I will be getting rid of it as soon as it's presentable!

(Four wheeled mobile)

Maybe I'll post here again but if not... Don't worry I'm probably actually living my Tao!

On The Home Front

All the extra travel we've done this year was a deliberate attempt to break free of a Rut. Taking our holiday to Bali and down the Centre was basically an attempt to break free of the rut, of stress, pressure, disharmony and monotony that our family had fallen into over the past few years.

Things were actually getting pretty grim at home and a fair measure of intolerance and aggravation at each other's idiosyncrasies was leading us down a path of despair! We thought, it's time to hit the road! We'll try it together before circumstances lead us into taking completely different paths... (Which would be a disastrous prospect for our little family). So we planned and booked a trip to Bali, Sam booked tickets for her and the kids to visit her mother for a period when I would be busy at work and we planned our Christmas break. Then there was the recent drive down through the Red Centre which just had to happen, (even though our credit card was already overloaded with debt and the bank account was empty) because neither of us could imagine life at home during school holidays with a couple of hyperactive kids! Thus to prevent the family imploding we resolved to get out of Dodge (Darwin/or at least our flat) at every opportunity to prevent a domestic Apocalypse!

The problems that besieged us appeared to be the result of what happens when two people, who have been living together for more than 10 years, move in two philosophically opposed directions. Or at least when their ideals appear to become incompatible.
My focus had been to reduce my impact on the Earth and live in the most sustainable manner I possibly can. My wife's approach had been totally focused on providing for our kids. (Not a bad objective in itself) Unfortunately though, contrary to what the TV adds tell us, consumer desires can never be satisfied by any quantity of junk purchased from Big W or Kmart! Happiness can not be found inside the plastic wrapper of a McDonald's Happy Meal treat! (Sorry but that stuff really peeves me!). Although we usually only watched ABC and SBS the amount of TV hours in our house was far too high!

We decided that allowing child no. 1 to watch videos on her own TV at night was counteractive to her sleep, play, reading, socialization needs. So we got rid of one TV, introduced a bed time routine and read stories at night and stopped watching Teley between the hours of 6pm and 8:30pm ourselves.

Not long after this we made our trip to Bali, and found the experience kind of stressful, especially at meal times and in restaurants, but the family was together and we managed to have some pretty special experiences.

Some time not long after returning from Bali our 10 year old family TV fizzed out and ceased to work... I drew a sigh of relief and asked Sam what she wanted to do. Knowing that we were already overdrawn on the credit card she looked at me and shrugged her shoulders. Taking the prompt I immediately said, "I don't if we have no TV!" She agreed and we have now gone about two months or so without at TV. Our only regret is that SBS have been screening the second series of Flight of the Conchords!
The benefits of living without a TV have been too numerous to count but basically we now read more, and argue less, the kids get more attention and our power bill has dropped... stuff like that.

We learned somewhere along the way that our youngest has an unusual bone condition and will require specialized surgery later this month! He is likely to be off his feet for at least 3 months and will require a great deal of attention. This made the holiday to Alice Springs an absolute must! We had to get the kids out and have a good time together before the pressures of immobility and full time care take their toll on us all.

The getaway was great. Our little fella ran around everywhere with the kids we met along the way, the place we stayed at in Alice had these enormous jumping pillows that he bounced on every day. On the way home we stopped in Mataranka and watched a local singer perform at the Homestead. Our little bloke danced and danced all night and had the crowd in stitches of laughter and joy!
As we traveled along the Stuart Highway we all had a wonderful time, camping, walking, playing. The desert can be a restorative place and I think we all came back to Darwin with a certain feeling of calm and contentedness. Along the way Sam and I got right into reading a book called How to Be Free. The book is written by an Anarchist who believes life would be so much better if we took on values more like they had in the Middle Ages! Somehow he struck a chord with me and I found the first half of the book absolutely inspirational! It was an affirmation of so much of how I've been trying to change my own life. What was more miraculous was that Sam and I found we shared a lot of the same ideas! Although we'd been struggling to agree on anything previously the simple act of reading the book out loud as we drove brought us closer together. Amazing. The Author Tom Hodgkinson often runs of on flights of fancy and makes some pretty hefty judgements, generalizations and occasionally, omits important facts when accusing others, however he is enormously entertaining and often hits the nail right on the "... F-cking Head." (Damien Hirst).
I don't care if he gets his facts slightly distorted. Just because I don't agree with him advocating smoking in community halls where there are children, or I can't stand the way he raves incessantly about the joys of drinking Ale doesn't alter my acceptance of his basic argument. Even though he makes a few misinformed and obviously antagonistic attacks on Alcoholics Anonymous, the first half of the book has been great! (I'm only now growing weary as I attempt to finish reading it on my own). If you want to make a leap out of the consumer trap give it a go. Along the way I also read Henry Reynolds book 'Why Weren't we told'.
A great read and once again reminding me of the need to live an authentic life, not accept the status quo and always question anything presented to me as "The Truth".


Youtube review here


Our trip down the center has prompted us to make positive changes in our lives. Since returning two weeks ago I have collected 4 bags of horse manure on my Xtracycle, prepared some of the garden for sheet mulching and have been watering our little herb garden every morning and in the evenings with the kids!

Yesterday while at the tip shop I discovered a copy of "Introduction to Permaculture" by Bill Mollison. This book is: ***GOLD***

Life is taking a turn for the better things are looking better every day! Who cares that we spent all our cash and available credit? Soon our second car will burn it's clutch out and we will go back to being a one car family! Who knows what opportunities that will bring with it? Maybe we'll travel by horse??? Or at least give more incentive for cycling?

So all that travel used up quite a bit of carbon, I know! However it may have saved us all our sanity and brought us one step closer to a more satisfying future with less.
Freedom is just around the corner!

Apple trees in suburbia

Recently I saw an article about councils down in Melbourne coming around to the idea of urban food production to the point that they are talking about planting fruit trees on curbside nature strips.
What an awesome idea! I sometimes think back to when I was a kid and our neighborhood still had elements of the rural area that it had been. I remember the creek at the bottom of our street, the open paddocks that were all around, and a horse that would sometimes wander into our front yard.
Our area had been old farming properties and there were remnants of those places that still remained long after most of the land had been converted into house blocks or roads.
I remember the old open aqueduct that used to be full of water and visiting the remaining cow paddocks to collect manure. There was an abandoned farm on a large patch of open land that eventually became the Northern Ring Road. And there were old plum pear and apple trees that in many cases wound up fenced into peoples yards or bulldozed.

Lots of things have changed but some still remain my memories are strong and I miss some of those old things. So many people have come and gone from that place where I grew up. I wonder if any of them notice the changes or the remnants of things that existed before they arrived.

Apple tree survivor of many changes

A year or so ago I was walking down the main road of my home town and noticed one of those special remnants from the time before. It was a single apple tree perched on the tiniest of scraps of land between a busy road that has undergone some widening through the years and a railway line that has been excavated to several meters below the surface of the land.
Ever since I saw that tree my mind has often drifted back to what my town was like when I was a kid. I wondered about the farms and the farmers, their animals and their lives. As I got older and roamed further I often wonder also about what and who was there before them. I explored and made all sorts of discoveries. Old gold mines abandoned quarries, discarded machinery all those kinds of things. Although I dreamed and I wondered I never found anything of the people who were there before them all. The people who must have lived around and loved the river that I swam and fished in. The people who would have known all the waterholes and special spots I liked to think I'd discovered. There were no obvious signs that they'd been there at all. It was only my wondering that seemed to give them any life at all...

When I go back there I look for that apple tree and wonder how many apple trees had there been. Who remembers them? How many are left..? Who notices them? I hope someone does. These things are special to me. Amid all the changes; the concrete, bitumen and steel, that tree is still there. It might survive long enough to see more changes. It could bloom one day to find a street full of apple trees have sprouted, and the songs of the old people might be heard.
Is there yet time for these life giving fruits?
(another rant!)