Duelling With Devils

Theme Songs of the Day:

1. "Paper Aeroplanes", by Angus & Julia Stone
2. "Only Love Can Break Your Heart", by Neil Young
3. "Neopolitan Dreams", by Lisa Mitchell
   

MAP OF TASMANIA, CIRCA 1916
APPROX 240KM SOUTH OF MELBOURNE

I'm going to Tassie. Tasmania, that is.

When I share that with the locals in Melbourne, I get one of two responses:

1. "Why??"
2. "Aw, yeahhhh, Tassie is BEAUTIFUL!"
   

I've heard that Tasmanian Devils really do spin around like in the Loony Tune cartoons. I've heard that Tasmanian Tigers aren't really extinct, if you know where to look for them. I've heard that some of the wildest places on earth are still pristine and hiding in this little corner or the world that most of mainland Australia has forgotten.

My travel companion for this leg of my journeys is Jill Rushton, the lovely Canadian that I met in Maui earlier this year at a pivotal time in my life:

After Christmas 2008, I sank rapidly into a fairly deep depression in which I did not make it out the front door of my house for most of January. I would lie awake at night waiting for sleep to arrive, listening to my inner monologue loop endlessly around thoughts of "Why did/didn't I do this; Why am I so far away from where I should be; How in the hell did I get myself into this mess; How the hell am I going to ever get myself out of this mess; Who do I think I am [bloody useless fool]; yadda-ydadda-yadda-doom-and-gloom-ever-downward-spiraling-blah-blah-blah......"

In the morning I would awake and lie catatonic, staring at the wall for an hour or so before mustering up the courage to get up and have a shower to face the sunlight. Being surrounded by so much natural beauty didn't help at all; it only heightened the contrast between how I felt within and the cheery surroundings without. I kept the blinds over the window to wallow in as much darkness as I could and found solace by distracting my mind with hours of mindless sessions on YouTube watching conspiracy theory movies, alien encounter clips, and other random obscurities.

My brother was a great support to me in this period, holding a safe space for me to move through this process, giving me room and permission to wallow without judging me, as if he knew all along that I wouldn't allow myself to linger for too long in this place of self-pity.

"I don't feel like doing anything, or seeing anyone today," I would announce gloomily. "Then don't!" was his cheerful reply.

I've never understood people who have had challenges with "depression", rather heartlessly writing the condition off as a sign of a weak and undisciplined mind. It's not. It is very real, and can be very scary - even to the most self-aware individuals. Depression is a very elusive, seductive creature: it beckons silently to you, lulling you into a sense of security and then drowning you in your own heavy thoughts. I can see now how the weight of it all could quickly add up and become unbearable, especially without the love and support of family and friends around you.

After a week or two of moping around the house all day and feeling lousy, I forced myself to get out into the sunshine, into nature, and do something, anything I could find joy in. This is when I started blogging, volunteering, hiking, sailing, swimming, surfing....anything to get me out of the house and having fun.

This was also a time to make peace with some lingering open wounds upon my heart, and move on into the next phase of relationship where you allow yourself to enjoy a person for who they are, wherever they are at, warts, old hurts, and all. After a two-year absence, I returned to Maui for Chinese New Year's Celebrations, which had become such a big part of my previous life, and was welcomed back with open arms, as if I had never left.

So it was there that I met The Canadian, her travel companion Kristen, and their chaperone [the perpetually hungover] Knuckles Tulio while stealing away to the hot-tub to relax muscles sore from a day's worth of Lion Dance and Kung-Fu performances. After two years fighting tooth-and-nail against brain cancer, Jill has recently lost the most important person in her life , and has embarked upon a journey to "rediscover both what's important to me and what makes me who I am." You can read her blog by clicking here.

Here I am, after moping around for the last month or so about losing everything, reawakened and finally enjoying all the beauty of life surrounding me... my breath is knocked out of me and silent tears stream down my face as I discover her story and see Facebook photos of good times....recent good times....shared with a loved one who has only recently left us. And again, I am reminded of what is truly important, and how lucky I really am. And of how beautiful, cruel, and beautiful life can be.

That experience has humbled me, and deepened my appreciation for the beauty of people and places surrounding me. I hope I never lose this perspective.

We're never really alone, are we? Our experiences may feel like we are the only ones going through this, indeed who has ever and will ever go through whatever it is that we are going through at that time... but the fact is that we are all more similar than we are diferent. We can find more that we relate to in others, than we can often find in ourselves. There is comfort and solace in the bond that exists between those who have had a shared, or shared a similar exerience. And we are all sharing a very similar experience - it's called the human experience.

"Are we human beings having a spiritual experience?
Or are we spiritual beings having a human experience?"
-overheard at a cafe, a long time ago-

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The Canadian has been traveling throughout Australia spending time with friends across the continent, blogging about her journeys here. The plan is to meet up in Melbourne, and head down to Tassie to share the cost of a campervan to explore the island for a week.

I've organized a stay with Peter Bedford, whose CouchSurfing profile says that he lives on 60 acres of wild bush in the mountains of Tasmania where "he and his family and working towards creating a self-sufficient lifestyle." Sounds wild.

The Guidebook to Hiking in Tasmania that I bought describes some amazingly beautiful multi-day treks, which I hope to somehow accomplish despite our lack of cold-weather gear. There is no agenda other than to explore, experience, and explore some more.

I am really looking forward to getting on the road again with new friends, and to making even more new friends, and to learning whatever lessons Tasmania has in store.

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From Dawn 'Til Dusk: Hog Wild

Theme Songs for the Day:

1. "Give It Away" by the Red Hot Chili Peppers
2. "Alive" by Pearl Jam
   

THE MISSING APOSTLES
[OH YEAH, THAT'S SOME OF THE ICONIC "12 APOSTLES" IN THE BACKGROUND...]

My chest is still rumbling with the unmistakable growl that can only come from a Harley.

My hands are cramping so much that my fingers hurt as I type.

My head is still ringing with the sound of wind in my ears.

My mouth is still twisted into an ear-splitting grin.

My buttocks are numb.

• 2 best mates
• 1200 ccs [mine...well, ok his wife let me borrow hers - thankyou Lisa!]
• 1690 ccs [his...dat buggah...]
• 11 hours on the road
• 500+ kilometers traveled
• 3 new muscles discovered

MEN AND THEIR MACHINES, OR
BOYS AND THEIR TOYS

Last night I was so excited I could hardly sleep. After downsizing my car to a motorcycle during the last months I remained in Hawaii, I've not ridden for almost six weeks and withdrawals have been kicking in... gazing longingly at bikes parked on the sidewalks of Melbourne, snapping my neck to see the machine responsible for causing all that lovely ruckus as it whines or growls or putts its way down the street...

When I jump out of bed at 6:30 this morning, my feet barely touch the ground as I pull on two layers of thermals, two layers of socks, two layers of tshirts, and then put on my borrowed riding gear. We hit the road a little after 7am, and I am thankful for the neoprene ninja mask keeping my face warm that I bought this week. I am not to feel my toes, or fingers, for another two hours when we stop for breakfast and coffee in Lorne.

The Great Ocean Road winds its way down some of the most rugged, and beautiful coastline of Australia. Loking out at the massive seacliffs that stretch away, you can feel the slow march of the entire continent's landmass into the Southern Ocean. Two thin lanes of cars and motorcycles skirt these cliffs - many of them sheer drops into the surf below - whizzing only feet away from each other at 100 kilometers per hour [kmh], separated only by a white stripe on the pavement.

Then the road turns inland, and rolling hills emerge from native forests, and asphalt carves sweeping turns through the changing terrain. The twang of eucalyptus oil fills our noses as the bike engines roar and crackle through the bush.

At one point, we shoot out of the mottled eucalyptus canopy into a cloud of blue smoke drifting across the roadway. The trees have changed, there are now pine forests stretching away to the horizon, and on either side of us are clearings littered with stumps, bright yellow heavy machinery, and smoldering piles of brush... my first thought is that we are passing through the remnants of Black Saturday, until I realize that the fires did not pass this far south. Then the scene is gone like a bad dream, and we plunge back into the eucalyptus forest at 100 kmh, and the acrid smell of burning pine is replaced again with the smell of koalas' favorite food.

The weaves and twists and turns are hypnotic, and the hours and kilometers fly by as we hit our groove: lining up our entry points and lines, leaning into the turns, and accelerating out into the next curve. My mind, which had been fluttering from randomness to randomness, quiets itself, trancelike. Each moment flows into the next, one long, smooth, continuous motion with no end and no beginning, ebbing and flowing with the surge and retreat of the bike's power. Man, machine, and the open road become one.

Until the conscious mind pipes up again, saying, "Where was I? I suppose I had better ride this bike now... who was riding it all this time?" ...and the moment, the magnificent flowing moment with no end and no beginning, which could have lasted 5 minutes or 45 minutes in real time... that moment passed.

I understand a little more about the allure the motorcycle, a.k.a. the meditation machine, and the open road holds for certain souls...

END OF DAY:
CHASING SHADOWS ACROSS THE LAND


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Street Music

AUTUMN SUN ON MELBOURNE

Melbourne's streets thrum with music, art and life at all hours. It's one of the things I love about this city.

The other day, I walked with the crowd up the stairs from the train platform at Flinders St station, in the midst of a mystical musical landscape created by a busker sitting on his guitar amp caressing his strings. The guitar had a clean tone, and the sweetly haunting music cascaded down the steps and washed through the crowd.

As I neared the top of the steps, a voice like butter wove lyrics that were vaguely familiar....after a couple more steps the penny drops, and I marvel at his strangely sweet version of Metallica's "Nothing Else Matters". His music is like eating foie gras: it's oh-so-good, and it's oh-so fine... and you know there is a dark side to the pleasure you are indulging in the whole time.

I step onto the crosswalk and into the night, surreal now with his music fading into the background of moonlit city streetscapes.

It happened so quickly - the time it takes to walk up a flight of stairs, through the train station turnstyle, and to the sidewalk. I have the presence of mind to flip a $2 coin into his open guitar case, but not to stop and take a photo; though my guess is that would have diminished the surrealism of the experience. The moment, and the feelings he evoked in me, are etched into my memory banks of Melbourne.

Walking around the streets of Melbourne, this kind of experience can happen at any time, so rich is the tapestry of buskers... I have seen child prodigies on pianos, flautists, guitarists, quartets, preachers, acrobats, jugglers, beatboxers, comedians, and freaks... some talented, some you would pay to shut them up...

The other day I read an article in the newpaper about Rupert Guenther, a Melbourne street-busker who honed his unique style of improvising classical music on his violin for five years, eeking out a living by playing music for passers-by.

He attended a masterclass in February at the renowned Julliard School in New York being given by Dr David Dolan, a professor at Guildhall and the Menuhin School. Dr Dolan was so impressed with Rupert that he suggested he audition in the UK at Guildhall's Centre for Classical Improvisation and Creative Performance. Rupert took his advice, and is now on his way to becoming an internationally acclaimed artist and teacher, like many of his alumni at the prestigous school.

Sounds like a screenplay in the making... I just love the creativity that just oozes from the pores of this city!

NOT RUPERT GUENTHER

NOT RUPERT GUENTHER EITHER!


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