Good night, and good luck

 

I can tell the way you hang your head

You’re alone and afraid

Through your tears you look around

There is no peace of mind to be found

Darlin’ reach out

Reach out

“Reach Out I’ll Be There”

-Four Tops (Holland / Dozier / Holland)

Today, I wish my friend farewell. Greg & I have known each other for 20 years, since we met in a mixed dorm at Charles Sturt University, Bathurst.

With a stealthy mix of early adulthood pheremones, drunkeness, freedom and lockable bedrooms, university dormhouses are purpose-built for sex. At first it creeps up on you, as you bumble past each other politely, eyes averted, to get to the shower, or moan about the cafeteria food. Then someone has their own TV, & you’re piling on to a single bed, and the sibling-style wrestling ends in heavier breathing and a deeper look instead of someone ‘having their eye put out’. Then the pranks become more ingenious, or so you think. Yes, let’s take Greg’s entire bedroom and recreate it in the bathroom. By then, wired with your own brilliance, you feign sympathy for Greg by sitting up all night playing 500. You nickname him ‘Scooter’ because he looks like the Muppet with his glasses on. You plaster Greg with make up while he’s passed out and weep with laughter as he tries to unlock his bedroom door via a brick wall. And then first year ends. You stay put, Greg moves to another dorm. Uni bar nights can end on or off-campus. One night, it’s up to Greg’s new, more spacious room, as he’s become a residential tutor, a supposed ‘guiding hand’ to the first years. And the looks and the want and the who cares anymore, we don’t share a bathroom end with greedy kisses saved up for a year and set free in the freezing cold as you ‘go outside for a ciggie’. Except it’s not Greg. It never was.

This is a true story of platonic love. My relationship with Greg is the longest I’ve had with a man. In the entire time we’ve known each other – 20 years – we’ve never so much as kissed. A lot of people who know both of us don’t believe it. At 39 (ok, he’s not 39 until January), we have grown closer. We love; we lose; we laugh; we share tall tales of tigers tamed, women wooed and men maimed for life; we answer the phone swearing at each other; we gamble; we talk. While our personalities mirror each other’s in many respects, Greg has been a constant, steadying presence in my life since we were 18. I have been a constant source of amusement and raw emotion in his. He MC’d my 21st and my parents love him. When I came back to Australia after five years in Europe, we picked up where we left off. Our lives took very different paths to the ones we imagined for ourselves at 18. I wore black turtlenecks and 40s trenchcoats and was set on becoming a foreign correspondent, a photojournalist who would somehow right wrongs and shed light on forgotten wars and suffering. Greg studied PR and wore a rather bizarre collection of collared shirts. When I realised I was not meant for journalism (about eight minutes after we graduated), I drifted through jobs. Greg stayed at uni, playing perpetual big brother to a stream of first years, before moving to Sydney and working at the Bondi Hotel. That’s where I last saw him, in 1996, before I hopped a plane for Amsterdam. When I returned, he was managing a bar and had led a fairly peripatetic lifestyle, working in hospitality in the Whitsundays and having a series of serious relationships. We’d both found, and lost, the great romantic loves of our lives; mine, ‘the Brazilian’; Greg with Chelsea.

We’ve had a decade together since then, during which time the prosaic Greg has studied philosophy and taught first year uni students (quelle surprise) and has STILL not finished his PhD; while I became a political adviser (truly, showbusiness for ugly people) and fed my passions for travel and photography. We both had relationships, something slightly out of synch in all of them. When single, we are perfect ‘wingmen’ for each other. I left politics in 2007, and ‘went corporate’ after a long time travelling in India; and then I got sick. I was very ill, but incredibly lucky. The meningitis left me weak and unable to work for months but it left. Greg didn’t. After I escaped my isolation room for a ward, I remember waking up from a ‘dosed up to the eyeballs’ sleep to find him sitting there, reading a book. He didn’t tell me how long he’d been there, but he was there, unasked but greatly needed. I got well again, and went back to politics part-time, to go back to uni and study, inspired by him. I loved it. He went to Europe, ostensibly for a ‘conference’, but I like to think he stayed on inspired partly by my constant yapping … and to reconnect with Chelsea.

Cutting this off now, as I have to put my game face on and say ‘later, biatch’, to Greg in person. He alone knows how difficult this will be; and if there is a god, pray that I don’t cry. I don’t actually feel that way, I’m happy that he and Chelsea are going to be together again, moving to New York, my new favourite city. Of course I’ll miss him. Who the hell will I go to the cricket with? Who would laugh at my dopiness in thinking I could pick the result, let alone the score, in Australia’s first game in the 2006 World Cup (FTR, Australia defeated Japan 3-1); who would start cheering for me to win and then laugh at himself when his glasses went flying along with tables when we won? I have a lot of male friends, mostly gay and sometimes over zealous in their mission to protect me from all hurts, perceived and real. Greg waits and listens, lays out options and offers thoughts, but never makes me feel stupid for the choices I make. He relieves the pressure I put on myself. He has made me feel worthwhile when I have felt unworthy of anyone’s care or love; grounded during the disassociative episodes where I, the almighty great communicator, can’t feel. At 4am this morning, I realised that I have been searching for the love of my life for 20 years; and I have had it all this time, in this true, constant, platonic love. So it will be ‘later, biatch’, not goodbye.

About a boy

The language is so foreign

I can never understand

Come Back (Light Therapy) – Josh Rouse

Today (November 1) is Communication Shutdown Day, a global push to raise awareness and funds for autism spectrum groups in more than 40 countries. https://communicationshutdown.org/?view=home. I’ve read a few excellent blog posts on the efficacy (or otherwise) of the social media campaign (DragOnista here: http://dragonistasblog.com/2010/10/31/autism-badly-served-by-communication-shutdown/ and Mike Stuchbery here: http://mike-stuchbery.com/2010/10/31/communication-shutdown-youre-doing-it-wrong/. The latter includes a good rejoinder from one of the people behind Communication Shutdown). Having participated in several social media awareness campaigns (most recently RUOK? Day), I thought I’d have a crack at a post as well. I am not a social media guru. I loathe the term, and most variations on it.  As you can see, I don’t even know how to insert links on my blog properly. What I thought I knew, professionally & personally, was how to communicate; until I met, erased from my memory, rediscovered years later, and fell in love with the man whose battered long-sleeve t-shirt I climb into on nights when I feel a bit flat and vulnerable – such as tonight. This is about a boy, a sweet, damaged, delightful man I love who has Asperger Syndrome.

I met Michael in 2002. I had just arrived in Sydney after more than five years in Europe and a broken engagement. I knew no one; so when I became the ‘ring-in’ in a tight knit bunch of people who had, it seemed, all been in and out of love with each other for a decade or so, it felt great. When I met Michael, it was a classic case of sexual snap, crackle & pop. I wanted him, he wanted me, & off we went to my new, barely furnished flat. The next day, we hung out and he was the first person to sit on my new lounge. The first person who arranged it like a bed and pulled me down next to him, and talked and kissed and cuddled to me for the rest of the day. When he left that night, I felt sure he was really interested in me.

The call never came. Michael was in love with someone else in the circle of friends, the ex-girlfriend of someone else in the group … messy is not the way to describe it. They ended up moving in together shortly after our night together, & I am big enough & ugly enough to admit that it hurt. That I could let my guard down – with someone so intricately connected to my new, and only social circle in Sydney – turned that hurt into an impressive nonchalance whenever he & his new partner came up in conversation. They moved out of Sydney, so I was spared contact with them.

Fast-forward to 2006. Friend’s birthday at a Thai place in Newtown. I’m late, bolting up the stairs to find a group of 20 or so … including Michael. We sat at opposing ends of the long table. He got up & walked away. Then I realised I’d forgotten it was BYO, so I did another runner to find some alcohol. Down the stairs … smack into Michael, who was on his way back to the table from the bottleshop. There was no avoiding it, so we said perfunctory hellos. I came back to the restaurant, we ate, we ignored each other. Fine. Until someone suggested drinks at a pub across the road. I lollygagged about, one of the last in. Mistake: he was waiting at the bar. For me. This time, he didn’t let me go the next day.

I am not the easiest person to be in a relationship with. Make of that what you will. With Michael, though, it came so easily. My new boyfriend was enchanting (and aargh! enchanted with me). We didn’t need anyone, or anything else. Completely entwined, intertwined, entertained. He would do the most ridiculously sweet & amazing things for me (like find old video of Sigmund the Sea Monster when I told him I loved it as a kid – and sit in bed with me and watch it); I would spend hours at antique markets finding additions for his collection of 50s & 60s kitsch. But there were signs that my candy-sweet confectionary world was fragile. At first, I just thought it was one of those, ‘bloody men’ things.Turning up hours late for dinner; inconsistent phone calls – either five a day or none; the fact that we couldn’t really stay at his place because he had pulled apart a car engine in his bedroom and was sleeping on the lounge. Then things started to fall apart. He would stop speaking to me for days at a time, and not come out to dinner with friends, not answer texts or frantic phone calls or think that I might be worried sick about him being in an accident. Worst of all, were the days and nights when he would arrive at my flat and cry. Just walk in the door, unable to stop the tears and unable to talk to me. This strange, beautiful, boy of mine was terrified of me trying to stroke his face; if I cried he walked away, hysterical, apologising, unable to allow himself to be loved and protected from whatever was hurting him. I adored him, and the more I tried to show him, with infinite excuses and open arms, that I loved the whole of him, the more he pulled away. I was drowning, hating myself for suffocating him with my anxiety and I started to react. If he was fine, I wasn’t; I couldn’t sleep, I was angry with him for making it difficult for me to breathe. I was furious that he didn’t understand how difficult it was to switch all of this and go to work, that he was totally disinterested in politics, that he didn’t accept a promotion at work when he was so dedicated and gifted.

The more he withdrew, the harder I pulled. He rang me one day and said, ‘I’m going away for three weeks to think about things. I won’t be contactable’. It hurt, but I had my warning. Three weeks to the day, he called again. He was back, he wanted to see me. He sounded so calm, I thought he had been on holiday and just needed a circuit breaker. No, he said when he walked in, I haven’t been away. I just wanted to disappear. I just turned my phone off and stayed at home, and decided:

“I can’t be in this relationship anymore. I can’t be around you. I can’t stand loving you.”

It wasn’t the words; it was the casual cruelty, the way the phrases didn’t seem to make sense and the way he looked at me.

“But WHAT, Michael – what have I done? Why won’t you talk to me? I love you, what are you doing; you cannot do this. You can’t do it? I can barely hold it together and you can’t stand me, but you love me. I just have to accept this?”

I screamed at him, begging him not to leave, pleading that I would be better, that I could be better. And something switched on inside him; and with whatever empathy he could summon he stopped and just told me he loved me; he was sorry; ssshhh, please don’t cry.

This scene played out again, and again. The monthly phone call, the tortured hours of crying and laughing as we broke up again. The inevitable knock on the door the next day, the promises we both made not to do it again, my all-too-ready kiss as I set myself up for the repeat performance. Like a pathetic, punch-drunk boxer I kept dragging myself up for more until I despised myself and he started drowning with me. I was still in love with him; and he kept coming back. He must love me.

It wasn’t until Christmas that he told me the truth. He was with his family, I was with mine. He called and said his brother was out of control, things were a nightmare. No, you don’t understand, he said. He’s got Asperger’s. So do I.

How could I have been so blind? The unwillingness or inability to socialise. Refusal to make eye contact with me. The problems with making plans for the future. The unrelenting focus on detail. It all made so much sense. Now I knew, we could work through this, together; I could learn to understand him, help him, let him go when he needed to be unseen.

A week or so later, after making plans to spend New Year’s Eve with me, he didn’t show up. He didn’t call, or even text, and I knew that was it. I will always treasure the wonderful things and experiences we shared. The great stuff was truly great. His easy, gentle kiss on the forehead. The deep, exhausted, intimate bliss as I lay in his arms, in front of the 100 watt lights and tin foil heater I bought on his recommendation. Getting busted kissing by a friend in a bottle shop in Newtown … and me not giving a damn who saw us. Watching TV with him, and the way he laughed at my foot stomping during the World Cup. The fact that he liked me without make up, in passion killing trackies. What makes me sad? The real and lasting sadness was that the last time I saw him, he cried in my arms for the first time. He wouldn’t tell me what was wrong; and all I can think of is that he knew then he wouldn’t be coming back.

There is a post-script, of course. I did see Michael again, at a friend’s birthday. It was September 2007 and I had a new boyfriend. I was planning to go to India. Life was good. Not golden, but I was as at least prepared that I would see him. He came into the room, he said hello to me and walked away. Then he came back, sat down with me, we talked as easily and openly as we ever had. Here he was. The man I had fallen in love with. Half an hour later my boyfriend called; he had gone home to Melbourne for the weekend. I pulled my phone out of my bag and looked at it, but didn’t answer. Michael had walked away. I looked for him and found him outside, alone, crying. At first I tried to make him laugh, but I couldn’t, so we both cried. I haven’t seen him since he brought me home the next day. Worse, he moved and has cut off all contact with the people closest to him, the friends who loved him and tried to understand. That group has finally fractured under the weight of changing relationships, children and I no longer see them. So, what will I do today? I will think of Michael and I will try and communicate with him. I will shelve my feelings and try and find him, not to love him, not to try and fix him, because I can’t do that. I can communicate. I can make a donation to autism spectrum disorder research; but I will not shutdown. Not any more.

Well I asked if I could stay and she said that I might

Let me be crystal: I am a big believer in love. I LOVE love. I love the idea of falling in love, that wherever they are, there is someone else in the world whose pulse quickens when they think about you. I love the early days of love, when you can be giddy, cautious and scary, all of those feelings for one person couched by a big safety net – their heart. I love passionate, excited love, the love that makes you late for work or skip a party. I love the deep, unyielding love, the love that makes you braver, better, more than you are. I love the stillness of love, when you rest your heads together, eyes closed, breathing in synch. To paraphrase Margaret Atwood, I love when love is that necessary, and that unnoticed.

But I’m single; I haven’t been in a relationship that’s lasted for more than three months in two years. So, my question is this: if masturbation is, as Woody Allen said in Annie Hall, ‘sex with someone I love’, where do we place the hook-up in the relationship stratosphere?

It’s more difficult than it sounds; some are the classic chemical reaction, eyes locked, pheromones loaded; others borne of loneliness and the draining, wanting to be wanted by someone, anyone. There’s the one you go looking for, and others that find you, such as the old friend whose goodnight kiss lingers, wanders, becomes somehow insistent. Speaking from experience, a one night stand CAN spark long-term relationships and friendships. Many, I suspect, end them.

I’m separating the ‘shamefuck’ here; no matter how good, if you part immediately after the act, it’s because you know it’s something you shouldn’t be doing – ergo the term. It’s not nice. It’s all sweary and judgemental. A one night stand may be awkward if it’s not fulfilling for either or both of you; but you’re not throwing socks at someone at three in the morning or checking the time on your way to the bathroom. It can never lead to, or be, anything else. Of course that can happen with any hook-up, but there’s something redolently unselfish about sharing a bed for more than sex, talking, kissing, touching until the morning, and into the day.

I have been in the very fortunate position of having loved, and been loved, twice. I used to say I was lucky until recently; but over breakfast, someone told me there was nothing lucky about it – and the more I think about it, I agree. You make yourself available in life. You choose. So do other people. Sometimes those choices meet, mingle and combust. Love. But like magic, there’s always an explanation for love, maybe a sleight of hand, but there is a reason. It’s not the preserve of the rich or the powerful. That’s why I don’t believe in ‘sex addiction’. If you really needed it, you’d take Woody’s approach, until you literally went blind. I think people who claim to be addicted to sex are really addicted to self-love. It’s nocturnal narcissism.

I still feel the outrageous delights of the physical expression of those two great loves of my life; and sometimes I despair at my loss. Whether they think of me, ever, and smile or weep is beyond my control. Luck didn’t end those loves, just as they didn’t fall in my lap. It’s the best thing I’ve ever had, that drug called love. She’s greedy, demanding, addictive. Love can confuse you, blind you, bite gaping chunks out of your heart until you think there is no way it can continue to beat. Sometimes it can’t. Sometimes love kills. There is some pain which cannot be measured, medicated or mended. So often, love endures, grows, changes and blooms again in our children and theirs.

None of this of course, is getting any closer to the original question: just where do we register the truly outstanding one night stand? For mine, you keep it with all the other good stuff. In the top drawer. If it opens again, well and good. If not, let it stay closed. It is what it is. A smile. A look. A laugh. A conversation. A kiss. On a new day.

From the archives: Poetry Boy

Friday, September 01, 2006

Friends someone asked who i text poetry to late on friday nights. it’s just one person. we don’t know each other well, but he once said to me that he was concerned for my happiness … which meant a lot to me.

he sent me this beautiful poem by margaret atwood a couple of weeks ago …

Variation On The Word Sleep

I would like to watch you sleeping,

which may not happen.

I would like to watch you,

sleeping. I would like to sleep

with you, to enter

your sleep as its smooth dark wave

slides over my head

and walk with you through that lucent

wavering forest of bluegreen leaves

with its watery sun & three moons

towards the cave where you must descend,

towards your worst fear

I would like to give you the silver

branch, the small white flower, the one

word that will protect you

from the grief at the center

of your dream, from the grief

at the center I would like to follow

you up the long stairway

again & become

the boat that would row you back

carefully, a flame

in two cupped hands

to where your body lies

beside me, and as you enter

it as easily as breathing in

I would like to be the air

that inhabits you for a moment

only. I would like to be that unnoticed

& that necessary.

From the archives: Getting off the rollercoaster

Sunday, September 24, 2006

Yep, it’s back to single in the city. I’ve done some big things. No more references to my ‘boyfriend’. Flirted with someone else at a Placebo concert, let him walk me home & kissed him for 15 minutes outside the front of my building – before wishing him good night & opening the door without looking back, giving him my number or taking his. I’ve cut my hair (always a sure sign!).

I find the small things about the end of a relationship are the most difficult to act upon. Should I throw out his toothbrush? Keep the shirt he insisted I keep because it looked better on me, the one I wore to bed when he wasn’t here? Delete the sweet text messages? I haven’t done any of this … yet.

I think it’s wistful – rather than wishful thinking. These are the things that make the big stuff come flooding back. The seemingly endless kisses; the tender & gentle intimacy that allowed us to drift off into a deep, unshakeable sleep, wrapped around each other. The look in his eyes when I did something he found amazing (mostly the things other people take for granted). Not being afraid to touch, or be touched, in public. The indescribable secret pleasure of his hand resting on my thigh as we ate dinner with friends. Answering the phone late at night, knowing it would be him. The way my smile shone, without hesitation, when I was with him. The insistent, unexpected knight who drove to my flat at 1am when I called, lost and panicked.

What do I feel? Furious injustice at not being able to tell him how I feel about the way he shut the door & walked away without a word. The searing hurt, bewilderment and self-loathing that accompanies abandonment is subsiding. My fear is that those feelings have nowhere to go, locked behind the door he closed; the eternal, damning, ‘why?’ roars at me in the early hours of the morning. Cool logic tells me to accept – however reluctantly – that the highs of this inconsistent relationship are stamped out by the crashing, crushing lows. I know it. Time to get off the monster rollercoaster & head for the merry-go-round. Only one problem: I’m a rollercoaster kind of girl.

From the archives: Will he or won’t he?

Wednesday, October 18, 2006

Haven’t written anything in such a long time; I hardly know where to start. I ended up writing to my ex to tell him how frustrated he made me & how sad I was at the way things had turned out. I told him about kissing a couple of guys when we were ‘off’, & confessed to reading a text message off his phone when we were ‘on’. I agonised over the ‘send message’ button until 3am & then thought, ‘fuck it’.

He called me that night; we talked for about two hours & met up with some friends a couple of days later. It was awkward for a bit, but then I let my guard drop. We sat next to each other & my knee touched his. I couldn’t move away. Our heads turned instinctively, a delicious intimate spark between us & a couple of fleeting kisses. We spent the night together & have seen each other since.

It’s been amazing; maybe better than before. He seems more open and willing to share his space & time with me. Still, there is a huge doubt in my mind. I want to ask him, ‘What’s changed?’, because something has changed within me. I’m afraid to love. I’ve been hurt in relationships before and kept giving, but now I’m not sure. Does he want me just because I said goodbye? Will he shut down again, just as easily as he came back? Has he noticed that I won’t say, ‘I love you’? How would he feel if I said goodbye again?

Some of my friends think I’m stupid; one of them was an old fuck buddy who put the hard word on when we went out last week. He was trying to kiss me outside my building & when I told him to stop because of my boy he told me he didn’t care, that it wouldn’t have stopped him taking me inside & shagging me if another friend hadn’t been there. The question is would I have stopped him, & I honestly can’t answer that question. I don’t think I will ever be sure with my ex, boy, lover, boyfriend whatever … sure of leaving him or sure of staying.

From the archives: Happiness and Contentment

Wednesday, November 08, 2006

My relationship came to its inevitable, sad conclusion on the weekend. This time last week, he called me & said he was really keen to make a go of it; three days later & we’re done & dusted.

One of my oldest friends raised a concept about relationships yesterday after we’d spent the day at the races: does your partner make you happy, contented, or both? At first I railed against it – he’s a philosophy lecturer after all, I felt honour-bound to argue with him, & we had drunk three bottles of champagne … anyway, the premise is that in a relationship, your partner and their attributes can make you content – there’s a natural ease and intimacy between you; they can make you happy – which you may not be able to define, but you know when it happens; and in the best case, you can experience both. I was content in this relationship, which is probably why I fought so long & hard for it. My strange, beautiful boy did make me happy. But we can’t have both, and it doesn’t work.

From the archives: My Brother, the Hero

Tuesday, June 12, 2007  My brother, the hero

Haven’t posted in aeons, so I’ll start with tonight & work backwards. Almost all of my family lives in Newcastle; luckily they weren’t flooded out during the storm. The events of the past few days will leave an indelible mark on my brother, Glen. You can find a pic of us on my site.

Glen is a senior crewman with the Westpac Rescue Helicopter service. Tonight, he featured in an ‘A Current Affair’ yarn about the crew they rescued from the bulk carrier stranded off Nobby’s Beach, the Pasha Bulker. It was the kind of story ACA should go with more often – the colour and movement beyond the headlines and clichés – instead of neighbours at war (or margarines vs butter).

I digress. The most eye-opening part of this story was that it made me think, quite deeply, about the man my brother is. Courage and heroism are more often used to describe footballers than frontline emergency service workers. Watching 9′s vision of my brother tonight, as he winched down a thin metal cable to the ship’s crew and lifted each man to safety, I thought about the qualities that made my brother so determined to make this his life’s work.

I thought of the sensitive, giving boy; the picture of us dressed in matching red jumpsuits (my mother’s fault … but that’s the subject of another 1,874 blogs); the fights – physical in primary school, juvenile insults in high school, then the worst – the vile, silent war of our 20s, both of us trapped by hurts and rejections, real and perceived. Our interest in, and understanding of each other was superficial at best. Then came the big bang; the beginning of a whole new universe for my family. Somewhere in the chaos and order, the Revelation and Redemption, my brother and I are slowly finding each other again.

For the first time in our adult life, I can tell him how proud I am of him, not just of his heroic actions, but for the man he has become. Because he didn’t lose the sensitive, giving boy who, like his older sister, lived in fear of disappointing others; the boy who tried – & surpassed – the impossible expectations he believed he had to live up to as the only male, the only one to carry on the family name; my brother didn’t shake loose the sensitive, giving boy.

My brother grew, tall, handsome and strong; but he allowed the boy to grow with him, into a man who can risk his life at the end of a steel rope, who can assess a dangerous situation and make decisions that you or I cannot comprehend, a man who saved 18 other men on Friday, a man who simply said, ‘it was quite a day’.

Quite a man, my brother Glen. My brother Glen, the hero. My hero.

PS: Westpac Rescue Helicopter relies on the generosity of its sponsors & business partners, & donations from the public. Find out more by visiting http://www.rescuehelicopter.com.au You can make a donation online, over the counter at a Westpac Branch, or send a cheque.