Checking In

Move: Completed.
Unpacking: Not completed.



This: New webcam shots location. No longer facing the window, so lighting shall be a bugger. Must remove that tiger.

I have an ulcer, coldsores, shadows and bags, cough, cold, shakes and my arms are killing me, but the birdsong here is surprisingly thick and lively, the shower is decadent, and that's my boy Sam on sentry duty at the perimeter.

Mattress on floor,
Me on mattress,
Blinds pulled back,
Bats gone,
And one satellite flares, then dims, and crosses into the shadow of the Earth.

This is the last night in the home I made.

A Life's Punctuation; the Full Stop.

That is the last cup of tea.

It, more than anything else, signals the End of an Era. That's the last of the milk. Once it's drunk I'm going to turn the fridge off, and that will be it.





I feel I should say something about the importance of true and vigorous independence, what it means to call time and space your own without compromise, and, I don't know, stuff, but I am tired in many different ways. My heart is sore, my mind is confused, and I have nothing in me.

So, I will drink my last cup of tea as I have done on many evenings.



And watch the flying foxes come out at dusk.



One last time.

The Year of Vanished Fish

Hey, you.

You're a bit lost right now, a bit bewildered to find your foundations absent and sureties you had taken for granted now unsteady things. There is, abruptly, a fog of uncertainty in your head, obfuscating your present and making a smeared water-colour painting of the future you're trying to aim at. You've never coped well with uncertainty, being a touch too gifted at taking all potential hypotheses into consideration when presented with any decision, but you're doing okay for now. Ish. Okay-ish.

That's all we can hope for, really. The uncertainty is you. Or rather, you are uncertain about all things including yourself. Especially yourself. You do not trust your own judgment, nor your capacity for logic, nor your ability to function. Lately, you've found yourself a startlingly unpredictable creature. Mood swings that have no trigger you can identify, nor any overarching plot to trace too. Violent bouts of crying that blindside you like a brick and disappear just as abruptly, leaving you nothing short of perplexed and confused, because while that violence ambushes you, you don't feel it.

What are you? You are not known to yourself. Not right now. For perhaps the first time. Your mind is now terra incognita.

No idea how people live like this.

In the interests of getting to know you, me, I, us, them, let's try a little exercise. I know it will be tough, because we've already tried this a couple of times with the result being Ctrl+A, Delete. I know your heart isn't in it, because mine sure as hell isn't.

But for the you, me, her, them that come back from the future to read this, some balance is required. This blog has become an unhappy place. You, I, we're only recording the misery. That's no fault of yours, I know. Processing the turbulence is more important than maintaining balance for the readers. But let's just try, okay? For you, me, us, them. For later.

Without further ado; things that made 2010 worth living.

And without further ado; I have deleted the list created.

Partly because it was forced. There is no capacity within me to be grateful for the privileges I've enjoyed the year passed. I acknowledge them, but right now I cannot feel them, and so to speak of them would be an exercise in lying to myself.

Also, I am battered and bruised and flinching. There is no capacity within me to trust the randomness of the world and its enduring capacity for capriciousness. If I were to announce the small wonders I hold close, then the acknowledgment would drive the world to then poison those wonders. Let them stay precious for now. Let them stay private. Let them be only mine.

Last year everything clicked into place. It was as though you had finally reached the age you have always been, and fit your skin and personality for the first time. You're a school of fish, and last year the fish swum out of their chaotic lack of coordination and began to move as one.

If you are composed of a million pieces, and those million pieces move as one, then that is almost the same as being composed of one single piece.

Almost.

Here and now, some of the fish are missing. Not eaten, not fled, simply disappeared. The remaining fish do not roil in confusion, although they are confused. They are lost. They don't know where they are going, and so they are not going anywhere.

You're a school of fish, full of holes and still in the water.

Sharks will find you if you stay like this.

2011 is going to wear me down. The decisions I've made will involve a great deal of fenangaling, and I expect to melt down often and with significant fallout. Even from out here the plans scare the shit out of me, but, scary things are worth doing. Remember that.

I wish I could go sailing into this year hollering and wild-eyed with some misguided sense of glory, delirious anticipation of the mistakes and messes I am to make, impatient for my triumphs and awards, and full of hunger for all that is unknown ahead of me. I wish I still had that strength, that willful heedlessness to all that might rend and scar. I wish I still knew that I would conquer the world.

It's come to three letters, two nested, each responding to the last, because by all that is infuriating and exasperating, THERE IS TOO MANY ME. We are an arrhythmic school of fish, and every damn fish has something to say. We, Planet Tessa, a fucking hivemind of one.

We have something to say to ourselves.

Maybe I'm not a school of fish, maybe I'm a migration of Golden Rays, or Blue Fin Tuna, or Wilderbeast. Maybe parts of me are meant to split off. Maybe my identity is meant to diverge and separate and be a fractured thing that will, later, come together again as something new.

It's 12.34am, and my ears are ringing with the memory of music. Music = mountains. There's mountains in me now, as intangible as music. This duality of being both immense and macroscopic in their extremes simultaneously is rare these days, it doesn't sweep through and out my head as often as it used to. But it is here now, and so I will ride it and say this.

You will not escape this year resolutionless. I had thought to let you off the hook this time, as the pressure of promises won't help you right now, and there are so many things you want to address, the size of the list alone will choke you.

You choked a lot in 2010. You're scared.

Now, now, now you'll be the spread lace of the Frilled-Neck Lizard, the raised quills of the Crested Porcupine, and the rampant fluffage of the White-faced Scops Owl. You're not dangerous, but you can pretend to be.



What do puffer fish do when they are frightened?

They make themselves look a damn sight sillier, but the point is made. In taking damage, they defeat their adversaries.

You are not strong, little fish, but you will be brave.




Also, you need a haircut.

This Heart Howls, This Knee Jerks, This Voice Says

There isn't enough footpath in the world. No, that's not right. There is. More than enough. But I cannot walk- No, that's not right either.

At this point I choose to return to this address, or, I feel obliged and I heed that obligation. There is only so many loops of these suburbs I can make before I run out. A street can only be walked once a day. Maybe once at night, too, but it is summer, and the daylight never dies.

The office released us early, as with all other work places given the crowd on the train. Nothing called for my attention. I lingered at work after the others had left and stretched out my last tasks as far as I could, but they didn't have much elasticity to them.

When I left, I walked city blocks, aiming for this train station, and then when it arrived too soon, aiming for the next train station, and the next, and the next, until I didn't know how to walk to the next station, and Hoddle Street is a cunt of a street to drive on, let alone walk, so I caved and caught a train. For the duration of the ride my legs jittered.

The Twice-Only Dimensional Insect Empire spies upon us all. They have planted bugs in High Street.

They. Will. Get. In. Your. Ear.

The printout in the window of the Palace Cinema said 'last days!' Ominous. These days never end. The attendant said yes, this was the last showing of Monsters. Nothing called for my attention. The ticket was in my hand before I'd even thought about it, before I'd remembered the trailer looked a wee bit scary.

With two hours to kill I walked up High Street. I wandered into every new and used bookstore, ran my hands over clothes I couldn't afford, and blinked in the unfamiliar sun. The point was to walk. To move. The point was to stretch every minute mission as far as I could, but, time is always more elastic, always stretches further.

Lunch was at 4.30. A bag of Doritos.

The sun is set. The sky is not dark. The flying foxes are so much scattered pepper washing past my window.

There was an incident with the last post.

If an agent of the Twice-Only Dimensional Insect Empire gets in your ear, it will eat your third dimension, and then, eat your heart.

Monsters is not a flashy action-thriller. It was an unsubtle social commentary, beautiful and restrained, understated without being coy, and gentle, so gentle.

The monsters were beautiful. They were not monsters.

Monsters only exist in the unknown. To know something is to strip it of power. To understand it is to have empathy, and even if that empathy is without sympathy, possibly with judgment, it is no longer unknown, and the monster is gone.

I am not a monster, I am just a person. I know no monsters, only people.

Monsters may be easier to deal with. Monsters always of the possibility of being wondrous.

No, that's wrong, that's entirely wrong.

Monsters only exist when we fear them. In which case, I am a monster, I know many monsters, you're all monsters, there are no people anywhere. Also, I am afraid of the hair in the shower plughole.

B said to T, you'll be on your way out yelling get out of my way or I'll elbow you in the face! B demonstrated this action. I was behind B. Our heights are so perfectly balanced to have her elbow hit my face.

I whispered intensely to B, while she was talking to R, that there was an eyelash in her eye and she had to get it out because I couldn't stop staring at it and it was bothering me. She dug and dug and finally got it. And made a wish not to elbow me in the face next year. Then gasped in dismay because she'd revealed her wish, and thus, it will not come true.

I retreated to my cubicle.

B isn't a monster. She left sherbet bombs in our socks.

This blog. As with counselling, I'm weighing the balance between its benefits and its damage.

I know I am......not easy to know? But then, is anyone? Perhaps I should say, I know I am frustrating to know. I am confounding. My continued presence in a person's life seems to demand more patience than is fair. Perhaps? Maybe? I am only extrapolating, really. No one has turned and said, "Goddamn you're fucking exasperating to be friends with." Not yet.

It seems to be easy to misread me, and normal to get me entirely wrong. Maybe that too is normal. Maybe everyone regularly experiences that chasm of dislocation that comes when you realise someone has completely misunderstood you, and that difference between perceptions will never be reconciled.

This blog is prime for that. All personal blogs are fucking ripe for leap-frogging to incorrect conclusions, no matter how well meant. It's just what happens when your primary contact with a person is highly filtered. How many of you can read my facial expressions, or my tone of voice? There's a limited number of you for which I can claim that degree of familiarity.

There was an incident with the last post.

There is comfort in empty spaces.

Immediacy is in the nature of the internet. Now, now, now. It's drifted down through our subconscious and is so much sediment, now, now, now.

Personal blogs are, by there very nature, personal. Some come to serve their audiences, for better or worse. Some come to a compromise with their audiences, for better or worse. And some just...carry on. Guilty as charged.

When I write my massive long confrontational confessional soul-bearing heart-rending WOE THE FUCK IS ME posts, I'm aware of the effect they have. Comments are mostly closed because of that. People care, people are compassionate, people want to reach out.

And I'm just...not easy to know.

Those massive long confrontational confessional soul-bearing heart-rending WOE THE FUCK IS ME posts are my healing. If I can write them, then the worst of the crisis is past, or I am at least in a lull. To write is to define, to define is to control, and that small semblance of power and processing makes a world of difference. Oh it does. If I can then post that writing, make public, have my voice be heard, then my head is above water.

From your point of view, it doesn't look it. It looks like the Apocalypse.

You never see the Apocalypse. That happens in silence, behind closed doors.

These posts, they happen after the storm.

I do. I love it. People can't help but smile back.

And I am...not easy to know. I do not want sympathy, something that has (just for once) nothing to do with pride. It is a burden. I'm sorry, but to know I cause you concern weighs on me heavily and is a point in favour of keeping silent, and I must not. If I want advice or suggestions, then I will ask for it, and you will know it. That which is unsolicited is so heavy, I'm not prepared to receive it, yet feel obliged to do something about it, even though I may not have the resources or desire.

Most of you have loitered here long enough to simply reach out, let me know you're there and aware. This means more to me than you can imagine.

Others will continue to push help, and even though I struggle to accept it with grace, I appreciate the care I'm shown and haven't earned. Who am I kidding, there is no grace, only silence. I'm an arrogant ungrateful cunt at the best of times. I will push you away.

This runs contrary to your compassion, your caring, and your desire to reach out.

Look, if you leave me unattended in a room with a blank whiteboard, there will be sharks. That's all I'm saying.

Did you know I have trust issues? Of course I do. Especially concerning people who appear to be concerned with my well-being.

I mean, for starters, I have confused ideas about strength. That is, to be strong means you must be strong, which in turn means never being weak, which in turn, can be externalised by simply never displaying weakness. You must be fooled in order for me to fool myself. So my nearest and closest are constantly hurt and rejected that when I am vulnerable and wounded I will not go to them for help, I will not ask for it or hint that it may be required, I will not allow them to be the friend they are.

Conversely, I know what it means to support such a weight. It is immense, and the responsibility is equal, and crushing. I love my friends too much to want to be a burden to them, I love them too much to ever make myself a burden, I will not do that to them.

I am too heavy. Too many people have dropped me. Too much hard work for no guaranteed reward. I am not worth the price to be paid. Those with a White Knight Complex adore me. They're like flies on bullshit, they can't keep away from my distress and anguish and raw bleeding emotional chunder. The smell of pain intoxicates them, and they rush in to save me.

I make a shit damsel in distress. FYI.

When they realise I'm not an easy rescue and I'm hard work, harder work, fucking impossible work, when they realise that I won't enable them to feel good about themselves for having rescued someone from their misery, they drop me, fast as they can, and disappear.

Trust issues. You think?

Concerned for my well-being? Want to fix it? Get the fuck away from me. Fuck off. Just fuck off. Take all your "good intentions" and choke on them.

Be my friend. Make me laugh. Honour me with fun times and untarnished moments. Sit beside me and say nothing while we stare at nothing. Let me be a normal person. Pretend there is nothing wrong so I can pretend there is nothing wrong, for a while, with you.

Don't fix me. It isn't your place, privilege or right.

That task is mine.

The last line in Monsters was, "I don't want to go home."

This is my flat.

Home is a state of mind.

I am out of my mind.

So many times I have nearly deleted this blog. I haven't kept count. This was turning over and over in my head. Depression frightens me. When the counsellor asked me about it, I said there was nothing not to fear about it. By extension I fear all things that may lead to it, and if something I post here leads to something that knocks me flat and shakes my already unstable footing with doubt, and insecurity, and shame, and hurt, and confusion, and uncertainty, and shame, and shame, and shame, then I must exterminate it. In the balance of things the potential for trouble here is great, too great, it is inevitable.

But. But.

This is my voice. The last bastion of my voice. With Baggage and ASIM: Best of Horror 2 out this year, my writing is ended. There is no more "forthcoming" and no more being written. I do not write, I am not a writer. This is all that remains of my voice. To use a voice is to be heard. If I cease blogging, I have no voice. No voice. No voice.

This is my voice. Violently melodramatic and self-pitying, it is mine.

Perhaps it would help to add an ACHTUNG! to the side bar, notifying visitors that this is an advice, suggestion and sympathy free zone. We are demilitarised. This war is purely civil, and, uncivil. It is a spectator sport, and no, you may not join in.

Doubt and insecurity and the fact that I simply can't see anything because I am OUT OF MY FUCKING MIND shakes me. Is this a good idea? Does it offend and insult you? Would it? More than I already have?

Even if I didn't have a blog, people automatically try to fix things that appear broken, and I am stubborn and prideful and take independence to unhealthy extremes. Suggestions must be presented and then summarily ignored, so they may sit in the hinterbrain until they are familiar and unintimidating, and I may consider them objectively instead of hysterically.

I don't know, I just don't know.

Thus spoke the Sages of Public Sanitation, and they were not wrong.

I've had two bottles of cider, which is a lot for me. The last food I ate was that packet of Doritos. Seven hours have passed. The hurt has not worn off. I am upset and doubt myself, ashamed of myself, and shame draws up fury, and so this post is a knee-jerk reaction, exactly the sort of post I make an point of not making. It is a rule I live by: do nothing and decide nothing when you are upset.

I am upset, but I do not think I am wrong.

No. Really. There were three whiteboards. I can't even share the third photo as it happens to be over a potential confidential document.

This is not a post that I have dwelt upon for weeks and constructed carefully. It's word and thought vomit. Comments are on. Go for it. Vent frustration and hurt at me. Be offended and churlish. Be understanding and wonderful. Talk about geckos. Vote on the ACHTUNG! Judge me. Don't judge me. Use your voice.

This is the last of my voice, and I will fucking defend it. No one is worth the triumph of self-censorship. The war may only be in my head, but you will be the casualties.

The days are long. Summer is the invasion of light. There is only so much that sunglasses can hide.

I stopped walking. Halfway between there and here. I did not want to return to my flat. I wanted to go home, but home is a state of mind, and I am homesick. I stopped because I could not walk any more.

And then, when I had been stopped enough, I started walking again.

Once again my heart howls. I've had such high times that the strategies of handling a howling heart have fallen by the wayside and I am out of practice.

Once again I must learn to be heard beyond that howling. There is nothing to do but cry in harmony, and relearn how to discover wonder in the mundane world.

My mind; my dictatorship.

Wonder, significance, meaning, resonance; these things can be hard to see at first, but eventually, with enough time, you learn how to see and everything becomes clear.

Home is a state of mind.

"I hear Interzone's really nice this time of year."

-- William Lee, The Naked Lunch