My Favourite Childhood Game

Some of my fondest memories of late childhood are of playing cards with my family.

That makes it sound like my upbringing was largely an unpleasant or unforgiving experience.  Far from it.  In fact so far from either extreme as to be mundane.  We fought over absurdities, then made up; we broke precious mementos, and were punished; we rebelled in due course, and were welcomed back into the fold.  Median and suburban.

But I digress.  Cards.  Most notably, a game called euchre.  A simple four-player, 24-card deck, trick taking game.  Score was kept using the 5 and 6 cards as counters (first pair to win eleven hands takes the game).  My father, mother, brother and I would play for hours.  Foregoing even the seduction of the tele for the evening.  The light-headedness, that squeal of delight when you flushed out the only card from an opponent that could possibly have offered a threat, thus paving the way to taking all five tricks in a hand was intoxicating.  Rare, but intoxicating.  I thrilled with vindication when proven correct about my suspicions of with whom the power lie.

Some years later, I taught several friends to play, in an attempt to wile away many more hours.  Most struggled to get their heads around the strategy of it all, and quickly grew disenchanted.

I was interested to see, however, that one partner had obviously experienced a similar upbringing.  She knew the golden rule about the scoring cards: never place the 6 card on top of the 5 card; its too heavy.

My Relationship with My Washing Machine

On the face of it, my relationship with my washing machine is rather a simple one: it washes my clothes when it feels like it, and I pay it lip service.

Bill Bryson wrote that he would just as soon get excited about his washing machine than his car.  I am inclined to agree.  A car is merely a tool for moving one from point A to point Z.  If it does not break down at points B through Y, so much the better.

A washing machine, however - my washing machine ....  My Ariston AV-149 front loading washing machine with 7.5 kg capacity, a top speed of 1000 rpm, and twelve different wash cycles (from a three hour, all-cleansing epic to an über-gentle cycle just for sheep), is a thing of beauty.  Or rather, was a thing or beauty.

When it first came home, it was sleek, quiet, efficient.  It sparkled like morning TV presenters' teeth.  And it disposed of dirt with the moral ambiguity of an old, spaghetti western bounty hunter.  Now its just a squat, jaded, hospital-white clunker.

In its heyday, it could knock off 40 nappies, 6 towels, and clothes for two working adults and one hyper-active toddler in a week without so much as a gurgle of complaint.  Nowadays, I am lucky if it can make it through a  cycle without gouging a hole in the wall, or regurgitating a long lost sock in a puddle of grey water on the laundry floor.

In truth, it is long past time I put her out to pasture.  One fine day, I will carry her down to the kerb, give her one final wipe down, and leave her to crumble into rust flakes.

Until then, the battle of wills rages on.

(P.S. This is not a metaphor.  I really am talking about my washing machine.)

An Idea Is...

An idea is...
A roller-coaster at the top of a rise.

Clouds are...
Impossible beasts,
Waiting to escape.

Dawn is...
The cauldron from beyond the horizon.

The heart is...
A blown-glass curiosity.

Fear is...
A rancid taste in the mouth.

Fish live...
From moment to moment to moment to moment.

Bitterness is...
A mite nibbling,
Nibbing away.

Only truth...
Makes lies worth believing.

An idea is...
A break in the fog.

Clouds are...
The lace between the stars.

Dawn is...
The end of solitude.

The heart is...
Best left to the valiant.

Fear is...
A cleansing of the senses.

Fish live...
Twixt currents and predators.

Bitterness is...
The lemon rind of memory.

Only truth...
Can emancipate the ignorant.

[First lines from each stanza borrowed from "Some Beliefs of Mine" by Peter Bakowski (The Heart at 3 a.m., Hale & Iremonger, 1998).]

A Beginning...

My very first blog - certainly a new experience.  If I'm not careful, I'll be tweeting next.

Started taking a creative writing class.  Great fun.  I am still very excited about the prospect - giddy even - like a teenager anticipating spending time alone with his girlfriend.  I love being around other people with a similar interest in writing.  It stirs the creative juices.  I think I crave the attention/adulation received from a well written or clever piece of prose (rare though that is); as well as the support from a group of self-conscious novices (like myself I hasten to add) that are loath to step on other people's toes for fear of retribution.  Nothing I write could ever be shit in the eyes of someone who awaits judgment on their own bared soul.

I took some creative writing classes/subjects many years ago, and in all modesty, I was good.  I can see that now.  At the time I was still striving to relegate Shakespeare and Wilde to the pulp fiction shelves.  I would spend hours working and re-working a single sentence, wringing every last rhythm and connotation from the words.  (Almost like Douglas Adams, passing his hard worked manuscripts to his publisher one line at a time.)  Thankfully, the English language is robust and forgiving.

I read a Stephen King short story some years back.  It's okay, I got over it.  Anyway, the character was an aspiring writer who suffered a similar inferiority complex with his own literary heroes.  At some point in his career (and I am assuming this character was at least a partial self-portrait), he just let go and decided his job was to write.  Simple.  He didn't have to compete with the greats; just learn from them.


At nearly forty, I hope I have learned enough to shine.