Orange

Mrs Woolf

One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well.

- Virgina Woolf, A Room Of One's Own (1929)

Mrs Woolf's truism called to mind my tastebud tingling farewell London dinner.  It took place at St John Bread & Wine Spitalfields, a London restaurant specialising in back-to-basics, no-squeamishness allowed British dining.  A bottle of Moët, good friends and a fabulously no holds barred menu (ox tongue and rabbit offal, anyone?).  It's enough to make a girl salivate...

These Days

My CD collection (yes, that quaint ridiculously chunky media) seems to have dated quite badly.  The only CDs I've wanted to listen to are Radiohead's OK Computer and The Bends, Teenage Fanclub's Bandwagonesque (unexpectedly classic), the Reality Bites soundtrack and the Royal Tenenbaums soundtrack.

Nico's rendition of 'These Days' (lyrics by Jackson Browne) particularly resonates with my current reflective state.

And is there a more poignant cinematic moment than when Gwyneth Paltrow's Margot emerges from the bus, looking slightly gawky in a full length fur coat, into the view of Luke Wilson's Richie who is waiting for her?  All falls silent.  Margot's blonde bob, pinned back, stirs in the wind.  Then, the gorgeous guitar opening of 'These Days' opens and Nico sings.  And Margot begins to walk towards Richie, slowly and bathed in a golden light, because time has slowed for Richie, as the woman he loves nears him.



I've been out walking
I don't do too much talking
These days, these days.
These days I seem to think a lot
About the things that I forgot to do
And all the times I had the chance to.

I've stopped my rambling,
I don't do too much gambling
These days, these days.
These days I seem to think about
How all the changes came about my ways
And I wonder if I'll see another highway.

I had a lover,
I don't think I'll risk another
These days, these days.
And if I seem to be afraid
To live the life that I have made in song
It's just that I've been losing so long.
La la la la la, la la.

I've stopped my dreaming,
I won't do too much scheming
These days, these days.
These days I sit on corner stones
And count the time in quarter tones to ten.
Please don't confront me with my failures,
I had not forgotten them.

Sunset

I was heading down the M1 towards the city the other day.  The weather had been tempestuous - the kind Melbourne is famed for; one minute pouring rain; the next, bright sunshine and holding it all together, a high, whipping wind.  The road was still wet but it was no longer raining as my car crested a hill late that afternoon.  And there in the distance, like the fabled city of Oz (excuse the pun), glistened Melbourne; its buildings reared out of the green grey mass of suburbia, backlit in orange and gold by the magnificent setting sun which had broken free of the dark clouds above.

It had not been long since I'd gotten back.  And I had been feeling quite disconnected from friends and family and their lives which have gurgled merrily along, gathering up partners, houses, children and more during the last seven years.  But in that moment, when I espied Melbourne's gleaming spires, I thought, 'yes!  I'm home!' and was grateful and relieved to be in a place where I could feel such a sentiment.

Last week, my lecturer was waxing lyrical about a sunset she had recently seen, but added 'but no one is ever interested in anyone else's sunsets'.  She's probably right.  But as long as we each have our own sunsets to dazzle and beguile ourselves with.

I didn't take a photo that day because I was driving, but here's one I took of a sunset at the South Rim of the Grand Canyon last year.  (Thanks, Poladroid!)

Back to Black (or White)

No, not the Amy Winehouse album.  Rather 'black' (or 'white', depending on your world view) as in the basics, the beginning.  Before things became grey, and life got overly complicated.  Because it isn't, really.  At the core is family, friends, health and doing something you enjoy, you love or even better, something that is all those things and is meaningful.  But to get to this, I've had to do a bit of unravelling.  And to this end, I've left the life I've built up over on the other side of the world for the better part of the last decade and travelled back ten thousand miles to the city I grew up in.  And am taking some time out to rethink the Box.

It's been a little hairy at times, but yes, it's good to be back.