Post One Hundred and Forty Three: For Reals.

This guy knows where it's at.

WHY IS HE SO HAPPY? How the sh*t do I get so convivial? How do I get there, during the course of my humble life trajectory?

I have questions today. Serious questions, because I had a very serious day.

I answered my first "Hello ma'am, my mum just died. Help me?..." phone call today. It was the worst Jerry, the worst.

I've been perfectly trained in what to say and how to say it, but when you pick up the phone and you can hear the pain in the callers voice as they whisper over the line from the room beside the one that their mothers/fathers/lovers body is going cold and stiff in, that transaction f*cking sucks.  Attention is aggressively pulled away from the clear view of the hot dudes punching the boxing bag in the gym across the street. The fax machine noises that have pissed you off all day vanish. Everything disappears as you try to dive into the phone receiver, twisting through the wire to come out the other side and into the person's mind-space. If only.

I desperately want the words to flow out of my face naturally during the conversation so that I can actually HEAR what the other people are saying (as opposed to what is going on in my own head whilst I kick myself for stuttering/whimpering/pitching my voice too high because I'm stifling tears).


And then I have to muster up the balls to talk to these grieving people face to face, mano to mano. In this arrangement procedure we talk about family history to register the death legally. We make choices like whether they require a cremation or a burial, a coffin or a casket, a religious or non religious ceremony; and the list extends to all the madcap things that you can do to celebrate the life of someone who has died. I have only just now begun to comprehend how much of a multi-tasking genius I have to be, how trusted I need to be by my folk, and how responsible I will be if I stuff sh*t up.

Funerals are pretty crazy. Ladies cry. Men cry. Kids cry because the grown ups are crying. Today even a priest looked like he wanted to cry. The lass that had died had lived very very short life. She left a small, scared child behind. Did that lady know a happiness? If so, does her child know that she did? Will her child remember the funeral in 20 years time?

Gosh, will that child remember me? If so, I hope I said the right thing.

Peace.

Post One Hundred and Forty Two: Release The Hounds.

One month of living in Melbourne is all it takes for most of what you know to expire.

More specifically, one month away from familiar custom is how long it took for me to understand in retrospect that what I had in Brisbane was bloody sterling. I miss my friends, I miss my co-workers, and I miss my heap of shit granny flat in Paddington. I realise that it's alright to have these feelings, but I feel like a dickbag for not reaching this appreciation earlier.

I had grandiose expectations about my new life here.  Presumptions of a type of rebirth into a dashing life of unconventional glory. This brings me to realisation number two; converging with new people is exhausting and comparing folk to those you already love will get you nowhere. Cities change, but my social inaptitudes endure. I will expect nothing more from Melbourne apart from death, taxes and f*cking great coffee and cake combos.

Going from the busy underbelly of the biz to a public show pony of death has been preoccupying. Repairing skulls and buttoning blouses has been replaced with squeezing the cheeks of infants, helping old folk up church steps and inspiring personalised floral choices. It's copacetic, but demands reflection on the change in pace from the days in the mortuary of listening to tunes and drinking tea on demand. 

Time, you tricky trickster. I will place no pressure on your healing ability.

Peace. x

Post One Hundred and Forty One: I Was Just Wandering.

And there ain't nothing wrong with a spot of homelessness.

(Obviously this is a highly insensitive statement to true homeless folk and I'm not actually dumpster diving and huddled in a trolley.)  I'm drifting from place to place until I find a home.  It's a bit shit, but I have hope that a house will be all like "Sarah, I'm cosy and cheap, look at my strong walls and generous pantry! I want you, I need you etc...."

It's a long story, but one that one day will deserve more than a brief mention. Needless to say, I am without roof of my own. It's not ideal by today's societal standards, but y'know what, it's a bloody thrill.

What makes a mortician comfortable at the end of the day? Is it four walls and a door to close? I think not, and something tells me that I'm in for some learnings.

Fate be kind, and bring me a chimney.

S.

Post One Hundred and Forty: MelBourne Identity.

Fresh! Au courant! Corr Corr!

I'm in my new city, and a fine city it is. I decree to make the most of my environs over the next two weeks, and I'm anticipating filling my face with as much food and wine as Melbourne can throw at me.  I want to get loose and bring in the new year riot style.  And I will. Cheers to y'all!

The twenty seven hour, five minute and thirty six second drive from Brisbane to Melbourne was a delight, and apart from a numb ass I remained wholly unharmed. With no road disasters to report and no bodies to be around, I'm left with no material.

There's so much to come. So much. Come with me boys and girls, in the New Year!

Post One Hundred and Thirty Nine: I Go There.

I'm leaving you, Brisbane. It's not you. It's me. I lack balls, you see.   

I have no testicles, that is a truth; but I also lack an aplomb, a surety about my viewpoint that a new megalopolis might lay bare. And one thing is for sure, people die everywhere. The inquiry into chutzpah begins; new city and new fatalities, yet the same perpetual questions remain about sentience and experience and pretty much all the shit that happens when people 'do life'. 

I'm now thus a wanderer with a knack for effortlessly natural mouth closures, reassuring back pats and meticulous bandaging skills. My resume is replete with the macabre, but the last three years have taught me above all else that I need to get out of my comfort zone. A life of convenience seems inherently vapid and spiritless, for me, for now.

 So to Melbourne I voyage, to Melbourne I seek! I wonder if the South is equipped?

Only time will tell.

Peace and mild hysteria,
S.

Post One Hundred and Forty Eight: You Make Me Feel Like A Wanker.

I hate the dating game. It's a thorn in my lonely side. Think about it with me, if you will.

I spend a lot of time cooped up into small, sterile spaces. I focus on and over clammy unresponsive corpses. Then, after eight or so hours I go home to 'decompress'. This down time sometimes involves baths. It sometimes involves wines. It sometimes involves Bruce Springsteen and a quiver of crackers and dip. More often than not, I think about how nice it would be to do/hear/eat these things in the company of someone else. I admit to owning romantic feelings.

It's reasonably difficult to meet someone that you'd like to spoon with when your money making activities involve aspiration, exhumation and repatriation. Moreover, it's problematic if you suffer from repeated bouts of sexually induced frontal labotomisation. Oh, how shit it is when you like someone and you turn into a mumbling and/or babbling retard in the presence of the very person that you'd like to kiss on the face.  I am like Stan and the sexy time target is Wendy, or however the South Park simile would go.

It feels like this disintegration of any personal social charm is worsening too, assuming that I had any in the first place. When I was younger I believe I was happy to make a dick of myself. I have learned a helplessness in my latter years like Scar from The Lion King, but I can't function well enough to imitate a crappy pseudo confidence.

I suck at the dating game. Let's jump to third base and buy a puppy. By let's I mean, me.

S.

Post One Hundred and Forty Seven: Nostalgicalidocious.

My Nan died. She was in that box, with me at her side. She faced the alter and I to her right, both of us with forced smiles and an inability to move adequately. I had a task to perform, and that was to arrive at the pulpit for the eulogy without vomiting or shrieking. It was a shitty deal, and my racing heart made up for her complete lack of beat.

During the service I couldn't stop looking at that box. I work with coffins every day. I fix the satin sheeting in them, I bang the nails into them, and I screw the lids down onto them. None of my experience truly prepared me for what it was going to be like, on the day, with her cold and very dead corpse packed into that small, shitty box. I wasn't unnerved about her cadaverous body (I'd prepared it the day before), but it was more the coffin in all it's gloomy jurisdiction that overwhelmed me. It was a symbol of containment, of barrier from us, that alarmed my sense of assurance.

It was in those moments that I realized that I could never wrap my arms around Nan again. Unless, of course, I was prepared to get on the ground in front of the congregation and wrap myself around the coffin like an activist around a tree.

I understand now, even more than before, how fucking weird death is. It's just so strange. You can be going along in your business and then BAM, you're denied of breath. It's uncanny and magical and downright intriguing.

So, with this first foray into burying my own blood, I feel nostalgic. I undertook the writing of my Grandmothers Eulogy as if I was Magnum, PI. I interviewed daily and wrote by night. This task was given the utmost importance, and I knew that if I could piece together her life with the right mix of colour, candor and integrity I would feel like I did a bloody good job. And I did.

Now I'm left to think about how I'm plodding along. Nan was a bit of a free spirit, and she didn't marry until she was 28. Free spirit may or may not suggest that she was a little bit of a coquette. Is it fair to place my timeline against hers, and see what she achieved and aim to do that plus a whole lot more? Am I a bit of a coquette? Awesome, if I indeed am.

I have technology, I have accessibility to the world, I have (relative) peace, I have an education. Let's go. I'm in. Death shows the benefit of life.

Through my Nan I can comprehend football, but fundamentally and most importantly through her I appreciate family and through her I perceive a most perfect love. Rest in peace Dorothy, you crazy amazing old bat.

 Peace. x
P.S. That's me (on the right) with my Mama and my sister Deb. They go alright.