1. Accept imperfection – Perfection is beyond us. 2. Share vulnerability – the bedrock of true friendship. Compassion for ourselves, generosity for others. 3. – Know your insanity – warn others, contain our follies. 4. Accept your idiocy – messing up is to be expected. 5. You are good enough – ‘Ordinary’ isn’t a name for failure. 6. Overcome romanticism – Love is patience and compassion for our natural weaknesses. 7. Despair cheerfully – We’re not individually cursed and many small things should stand out: a sunny day, dawn and dusk, etc 8. Transcend yourself – Cosmic humility is taught to us by nature, history, and the sky above us; delight in being humbled by it.
Gratitude Journal
I am so happy and grateful to know that I won’t be working at this school next semester. I’m sad in one way but excited in others. Knowing what will happen next semester is the best option.
You’ll stop caring what people think about you when you realise how seldom they do.
David Foster Wallace
To-do list
Enjoy new activity with students. ✅
Think before speaking. Listen first. ½
Gym straight after work. ✅
After squats meditate for 5 minutes. ✅
Fill out dreams for dream decade challenge. ✅
Easy, perhaps somewhat boring, day. Being surrounded by the other foreign teachers it was a struggle not to complain and when I thought about it more I realised I’d left my bracelet at home so I’m giving myself a day of forgiveness. I’ll wear it tomorrow and try to be more conscious of not joining in the complaining.
21st Mar 2024 – I would wear a bracelet that I would have to swap hands every time that I complained. I would mostly forget to do this until later but it was an effort to become conscious of complaining. I think I only managed to do this for a month or two in the end.
Knowing I won’t be teaching here next semester has kind of lifted off any real burden to overperform. I do still feel like doing my best for the students though. Tomorrow will be more of the same at school. Afterwards is the dentist and then meet with George and Bruno. They have kind of opposite personalities but both with virtuous hearts – I think I sit somewhere in the middle so conversation should be interesting.
I hope to get some information from George on what to expect when teaching back at CRPAO.
What is an unusual habit or absurd thing you love?
I’m not sure that I have an unusual habit – if it’s a habit it would be pretty normal.
Absurd things I love though – that would have to be the music I enjoy. I really enjoy music that is difficult to listen to. Cerebral I guess most would call it. Sometimes it’s not even something I enjoy listening to – well, the music – I enjoy the process – the emotional response – even if it is negative.
Amy would be able to list so many things for me here – she really doesn’t enjoy most of the movies I like either.
Despite years of trying to shut my brain off, it looks like I actually enjoy thinking.
Gratitude Journal
I am so happy and grateful to wake up a little earlier than normal today and walk around my garden as the sun was not yet risen over the mountains. It was cold but peaceful. Kim joined me, running with her little legs as fast as she could.
I think I compare myself with most people in my life. Friends, family, relations. Is it productive? I’m not often jealous of things other people do or things that they have, except their happiness or serenity. They often seem more capable to deal with things, though perhaps they’re not? It’s just what it looks like to me.
I noticed recently some people saying things bad about others and took it to be more about themselves – so and so is a miserable bastard, he’s a moron…etc… I have to make sure to catch myself if I ever do that.
Gratitude Journal
I am so happy and grateful that it is sports day today and that I don’t have to teach. Many of the foreign teachers are hiding away inside maybe preparing lesson plans etc but I think I’ll hang around with the kids because this is the best time to be with them. They feel free and happy and will try to talk more than in the classes. The kids are why I’m here.
Hoo-ee! I woke up yesterday morning after 16-20 hours of restless sleep, through 42-degree heat, though a cool change was in the air, it hadn’t quite made it to the upstairs in our new house. I was totally betwattled.
Even the first coffee was no cure and I lurched around the supermarket uncertain why exactly I was there. I figured it out in the end and shopping done I contemplated going back to sleep again. The second coffee finally kicked me into gear but I had nothing to do except some reading and waiting for the man to come and give us internet again. I stayed awake with both fans blasting and kids shouting in their backyard, perhaps hunting the floppy-eared white rabbit I saw hopping down the street earlier.
In fact, by the time evening came round I was no longer sleepy, contemplating security in our new house and a message I got from my cousin Sharon, that my mother was sick again and back in the hospital. I got to sleep what felt like just a couple of minutes before my alarm went off and here I am back at work again, dopey-eyed with spinning stars.
My mother suffers from COPD, basically what emphysema develops into. She needs oxygen all the time now and gets chest infections very easily which knock her down. The infections are usually fixed with a course of antibiotics but consistently return when they are finished. It’s been like this for the last 12 months or so.
She finally had to leave her home and now lives in a nice care home. She was sad to leave and lose the independence she loved but she understands she couldn’t go on there anymore as she needs fairly constant monitoring. The sale of the house should cover her care home expenses for a few years.
Being a practical sort, my mother often told me not to return to the UK for her funeral as it is a waste of money. Amy and Sharon have both asked me if I want to go and visit but, practically, there isn’t much I can do for her, she will feel upset that I spent a lot of money to visit and I think she doesn’t want me to see her so invalid. She has always been so strong.
She has a Do Not Resuscitate order in place, saying she doesn’t want to hang around suffering and just being kept alive for the sake of it. She saw that happen with her sister. I hope she’s not suffering.
I did go and visit her about 18 months ago after she was taken to hospital for the first time. She was still able to do things to take care of herself at that time and it was really nice to be able to sit back and relax in my old family home, just chat and watch TV. I actually enjoyed being back in the UK, it was the tail end of summer so some days were comfortably warm but it was also nice to feel that clean English chill in the air some nights. These are memories I would like to keep of the last time to see my mother. Somewhat selfish I know.
My mother’s sickness it most likely smoking-related, though she quit about 20 years ago already, she had smoked for about 20 years before that. With cigarettes always around I soon started pinching some and the few times she caught me smoking she couldn’t really say anything to deter me. I finally stopped smoking myself when my son was born. My own father died of smoking-related lung cancer before I was two years old.
As I was walking from my desk to the kitchen in the office, I got this sudden urge to kick a football. I almost took a swing at an invisible ball mid-stride. Do you know that feeling when the ball strokes your foot at the perfect point and shoots off ferociously towards an imaginary goal, avoiding the desperate stretch of the imaginary keeper? Since school days I mostly did this by myself against a brick wall. When I’m settled in Thailand again I’ll have to get a football and then all I’ll need is the brick wall.
I was on the school football team from middle school until I left high school, aged 16. I was pretty passionate about it for a while there. Actually, I was passionate about it until I came to Australia really. There wasn’t much of a league going on at that time and there were no live games or much in the way of replays from England then either. I got interested in cricket for a while, especially as Australia couldn’t lose a game for trying for a while there. But Australian Rules football ended up being my new passion, but that’s another story.
In middle school, the best players from years 1 and 2, and from years 3 and 4 would make up the school teams. This was a big honour if you were in the lower year of the two but, as is the way of school kids, everyone stuck to just being friendly with kids in their year. Even though you had the privilege to play with the older kids against other schools, no one talked to you.
In the summer break between years 3 and 4, I had been picked to go to a soccer selection camp but as the date drew nearer I lost my nerve and told my mum I was too sick to go. I’m not sure why I felt like this now. Was I too shy, too scared, too insecure? It’s possible I missed a great opportunity and my football coach at school was disappointed when I told him I didn’t attend. I’d like to say I paid him back by helping us win every game and scoring lots of goals that year but to be honest I can’t remember now.
In high school, I maintained a place in the team as the centre-forward but I recall us losing more games than we won. I don’t recall scoring too often either. The worst, although possibly the best, memory is when we played another school that just didn’t give a shit. We tried so hard and they just kept kicking the ball back and laughing at everything we did and everything they did too. They cracked up at each other’s mistakes and unbelievably ended up beating us something like 3 goals to 2. I think I knew it was over then. Football wasn’t for me. Particularly as my only other memory is playing in a hail storm and though we stopped the game, there was nowhere to hide as those painful little pellets peppered our faces and legs. Fuck that for a game of football.
Our inter-school games were on Saturdays and I used to ride my bicycle the 4 miles to town and then up the hill to school. It was around this time I started getting into music very seriously. Our tiny local record store, which still thrives to this day, would attempt to track down rare imports from America for me. I would bring them lists of records I’d heard about in borrowed copies of Maximum Rock ‘n’ Roll or that were occasionally mentioned in Sounds or NME. I can’t clearly remember the day picking up Bad Brains 12″ on Alternative Tentacles and Black Flag’s ‘Damaged’ album on Unicorn. Our football game was in the late morning this day and I picked up these records before riding up to school. It was a bit of an annoyance to have to lug them around with me but I was so excited I couldn’t help looking at the covers as we travelled on the bus to our away game.
I recall nothing about the football game that day and know that when I got home I would hide the records under my shirt as my mother was sure to ask where I got the money from to buy them. Well, mum, that lunch money you gave me…. never had a lunch in the whole 3 years I was in high school. I would beg and borrow pennies from my friends and just eat a couple of lollies from the ice cream van. This may explain why I became such a skinny-ass weakling and my lack of enthusiasm for playing sports so much around this time.
Those two records I bought that day had such a huge impact on me. Black Flag spoke directly to me somehow, even though they were singing about getting beatings from the LAPD and I was sulking because my mother made me do my homework. ‘No More’, ‘Room 13’, ‘Depression’, ‘Padded Cell’, the intensity, the passion, the violence! I was 15 at the time – hearing those songs now will take me right back to then.
With Indian ink, a needle and the aid of a mirror I tattooed myself the bars, smart enough not to reverse them in the reflection. It wasn’t until years later in Australia that I got them tattooed properly and they sit proudly on my upper right arm, a reminder of who I am and where I am now.
I did a whole bunch of my own tattoos with a simple needle and ink, though all but a few have been covered over with more professional art since. I was partly inspired by a heavy metal girl at school whose name I now forget. She was mad as fuck, not to be messed with and had ‘666’ tattooed on her forehead, though hidden by her ginger hair. I later heard she became a born-again Christian though I’m guessing that might’ve been someone’s idea of a joke.
My own dodgy work, including ‘LIFE IS PAIN, I WANT TO BE INSANE’ (again Black Flag-inspired, more specifically a tattoo that adorns their singer Henry Rollins) seems to have served me quite well in some instances. Whilst they might’ve been a reason for a beating when I was younger, these days it tends to keep people at bay and an indicator not to mess with me. Which is amusing because I generally will run a mile from any trouble anyway. I’m also a pretty friendly guy too. These days I tend to actually like people.
Thinking about tattoos also reminds me of a couple of experiences in China. The first I was walking through some back allies in Beijing, just enjoying the experience of being lost. I ended up a small square with just a couple of older folks around. One guy was pulling a cart along and stopped to look at me out of curiosity. As I got closer he reached out and grabbed my arm and just ran his hand up and down my tattoo, laughing in wonder. I laughed with him for a minute before we both went on our way, realising we had no other form of communication to take this encounter any further.
The other time I was travelling with a bunch of Aussies from all walks of life, as part of a dragon boat team. One of the ladies was an Occupational Health and Safety officer, hard to say how old she was, but she seemed much older than me. Even now, I feel most of the people I meet are older than me, perhaps a refusal to believe that I am not in my early 20s anymore. This lady looked at my tattoos and started asking questions about them and then finished the conversation with ‘You’ll regret them when you’re older.’ I was 41 at the time.
My tattoos are my own historical document. Memories for me to consider, a past to ponder. Anyway, as I often tell people, ‘They come off when you die.’
—
Amy is getting excited and it’s infectious. We have some locals building our fences and as we’ve given them no time frame they’ve arranged themselves a party table in our garden where they can kick back after a day’s work with BBQ and whisky. Apparently, around 5pm cool breezes waft across the valley and it’s a perfect indicator that it’s time for a relaxing icy cold drink of your preference.
The Burmese builders have finished building their shacks and have also set themselves up a party table, though for them it’s also their breakfast, lunch and dinner table. Our house is a party house before it’s even complete. I get the feeling the locals might still come around to party after they’ve finished here too.
Amy is choosing wall paint colours, inside and out and looking more seriously at bathroom fittings now. It’s exciting, though as we discuss, a little weird as almost everything should be complete by the time I get there. I can just breeze in and go to bed in a brand-new home. I hope, anyway.
“Do you want a 6-pack? There’s a new way instead of doing repetitive sit-ups! Now you can get six-packs with a new proven method!” 35 dollars and a six-pack to my name! SIX PACK!
Freaking out in my head again – feel like my brain cells are disappearing – information is leaking away. I seem to spend my time wishing for better days, wasting the ones here and now. I find myself in conversations not knowing what is being talked about – my mind snapped to elsewhere. Everything feels fatigued or full of potential fatigue, stopping me from starting anything. Where is this coming from? Where is it going to end up?
Spoke to Mum on the phone – I didn’t have much to say. Felt like throwing up. Felt like crying. She keeps her life going along.
I feel like my major aim in life should be to try to ensure that Hayden doesn’t go through these feelings – help him overcome this despair – but I can’t even help myself!
Labor Day Holiday. I thought there was people everywhere before but now it’s even worse. I can’t help laughing at all the people who stare!! So far, this trip seems like a series of little adventures – perhaps little adventures are what makes up a life and when you stop having those adventures you stop living. My life should only be adventure. I want to live. This is a beautiful temple – but spoilt by crass commercialism. I would like to find somewhere peaceful and tranquil – this place has tacky shops selling junk. And popcorn – I can’t believe it! One woman’s eyes nearly popped out when she saw my tattoos….makes me laugh!
Just remember that every single person in this world is different. But all human.
We make today a special day (oh, very holy) and decide to head to the beach for the first time in this fair land. We look forward to it all day but its about 4 o’clock by the time we get there, heading south to Cronulla, through the bushy suburbs of the city to what seems like the outskirts.
My eyes are stuck to the windows of the train, our usual journey into the city is lined with factories and industry and where it is suburban all the houses are visible, but here all you can see is trees with the odd corners of houses sticking out or braking the skyline. Some houses are built on steep embankments above small tree infested valleys, stilts sticking out of the floor of the construction, going down twenty, forty feet til finding ground to support from.
Over a bridge over a river with a peninsula in the foreground standing high, along the waters edge, small boat buildings and above, up the windy steps, huge houses nestle in the bush, the wealthy cats must hang out there.
Cronulla, last stop on the line, this train terminates. It’s a blistering hot day but the cool breeze is blowing off the sea to the station and we follow our noses to the beach, past a hardcore record shop where skaters hang out outside listening to the music blasting away, what more could you want? It briefly reminded me of Black Flag coming from Redondo Beach, but with a blink my mind was captured by the sight of the beach, beautiful warm yellow sand in a tiny cove lined by slippery slimy rocks which went off one way round the corner and out of sight and the other leading to the main beach, apparently the longest stretch of sand in the area.
We walked round, past ocean baths, swimming pools built into the rocks and watered by the ocean, a safe swim and if you go to the ocean edge of the pool the wave will bash up against the side and over your head. We carried on, to our left, blocks of flats towered on the small cliff but trailed off as we walked round the corner and the sand started again. We laughed and played like kids in the sand and remembered the times we used to go down to the beach after work, with John, when we lived in England, it being a similar time of day (despite the lateness the sun was still high and hot).
We ventured into the water, very slowly, it was freezing to our little hot bodies, slowly letting it envelope us, but after a few metres the waves became bigger and we didn’t have much choice about getting wet. Once in though it began to feel warm, our bodies adjusting. We watched the other kids body surfing, catching a wave and swimming with it and we attempted to imitate them with little success at first but after a while I caught a wave and frightened myself as I was riding this wave, my head was in front of it and all I could see in front of me was bare sand, no water! I was flying along about two feet above the ground, but the wave broke and cushioned my fall to the sand and I got up, huge grin and back out to try it again.
The next time though we were both stood awkwardly and we got dumped, I went under for about five seconds and all I could see was the white wave all around me, when will I come up!? I found Broni and she got hit bad, dragged along the sand on her back and tumbled into a somersault, she retired hurt and slightly embarrassed, but it did make us realise the power of the water.
I went back in and the waves grew stronger and stronger, one minute the water was knocking round your ankles, the next it was too deep to touch the bottom, big waves which we would never see in England, I managed a couple more rides before getting out and drying in the sun as it slowly set over the other side of Australia.
1980: Damned – Machine Gun Etiquette Dead Kennedys – Fresh Fruit For Rotting Vegetables
1981: Restricted Code – First Night On Nine Below Zero – Three Times Enough Dead Kennedy’s – Too Drunk To Fuck Crass – Penis Envy
1982: Black Flag – Damaged
1983: Social Distortion – Mommy’s Little Monster Minor Threat – Out Of Step
1984: Husker Du – Diane DOA – Bloodied But Unbowed Anti-Sect – In Darkness There Is No Choice Subhumans – Cradle To The Grave Black Flag – My War UK Decay – Werewolf Cult Maniax – Cold Love Black Flag – Slip It In Black Flag – Family Man Subhumans – Rats Wasted Youth – Wild and Wandering
Phone Numbers: Paul Chambers Andy Anderson Justin Butler Simon Bradbury Dave Brown Alan (Josh and John)
1994ever 