ink marks on a blank page Sat 22nd August

For us here in the Antipodes Spring, and all its renewables is just around the corner. August,for me, is always a profound month,details of which I shall not bore you with except to add that it concerns the 28th and 1972. As a result some Augusts become watersheds of agendas,the setting of , at times completions of. I'm talking about leap forwards, change, moving on and all that entails. That I do so at this time is not through some mystical force of habit but is in part due to how everything else is changing around me. This year I feel is going to be special,there is such an energy about, not just in my garden but in the park opposite and in Nature per se. I noted earlier this year that the parrots and lorikeets had outstanding colour in their coats . The year forward has borne that out , we have had good rains with the prospect of a nice folllow up lot to come. Looking out of the window at breakfast this morning,I saw a group of Adelaide Eastern Rosellas fly past to land in the large gums across the road,there to feed.Their coats were so brightly coloured in an almost luminescent green the morning sun glinted off them. My fruit trees out in back have got blossom on, the buzzy bees are even at this early hour are working hard.So, what do you think,let's go get 'em , aye....move on ,change, up and at life big time....just do it ! IT"S TIME The picture I post is from the front seat of my car as it barrells along the Calder Highway (Victoria) ,note the ice in the ditch to picture left,it was early morning and damn cold. Driving towards something new is always for me a metaphor for change, as this trip was, so shall it be done.

Done it has been.You might have guessed that the above was written some days ago, or perhaps it really doesn't matter as this write is for the here and now, this instant,forthwith etc etc. I once participated in a judgement where the presiding Judge made an order forthwith,lovely word that, resonates with not only a natural sound of deliberation but one of finality coupled with great purpose. Back to the object in hand, it is so that I as an individual have done some nice things,some good things,one or three really great things and some not so very nice things. Of the not so very nice that I speak about at this moment. Refer to November 1972, after the events of August of that year, I resolved that the not so very nice things should be expunged from the slate of the robbi life.That is all the folk that had been wronged at my hand would be contacted by all and any means, and properly apologised to, asked forgiveness for and/or if possible absolution. Over much time ,lots of effort, all the addresses,phone numbers etc etc were laid before me so I bent to the task. We aren't talking about hundreds here, there were to my memory about 15, no more than that. Really though 15 is enough isn't it?
Did my thing over about a week, two rang me as they had been rung by another ,saying not to worry I can't remember you anyway. But have a guess just how many did care or want to get me to say 'Mea Culpa' ? Right, you have it in one, not one person actually cared less. This of course had me in a quandry, did I matter so little that even my boorish ways went unnoticed, was I so insignificant that even peeing into Jane's tuba in a drunken stupor mattered naught? Was the night I spent locked in Christine's loo because I couldn't find my way out causing the rest of the guests to use the bushes outside whilst I slept in the bath oblivious, was that not a hanging offence? Perhaps not, it may be if course that these good folk saw the mirth in the situations described , chuckle mightily over the years , then turn them into amusing dinner anectdotes to amaze their collective A list friends. All that did leave me a trifle deflated, not dispirited mind, just a wee bit flat.( no pun intended). That this exercise is not repeated each August is down to the fact my long suffering Hortense keeps me from uttering a word about November 1972, a good thing as well. But in reality, I do miss the hair shirt a little.

The movie today was spot on wasn't it Horty old girl. You concur, well that is a turn- up for the books, normally you disgaree immediately. District9,odd title that but that really was the whole point wasn't it so Hortense, just referring obliquely to Apartheid actually. We grew up with that you see Horty, most of our younger readers would have no idea just how bad that time was. Nelson Mandela incarcerated in that dreadful prison, the man must be a saint the way he came out of there with so much dignity. Talking about saints Hortense, at Cocolat the lass who made our gelato today was a little humdinger wasn't she. Such large and generous scoops she gave, sublime wasn't it, of course I'm talking about the gelato Hortense, what else?