Aflame

The lovely rain I described in my last post - almost two months ago - was followed by only a few showers before the heat and dry wind swept in from the west, bearing the hopes, dreams, and topsoil of generations of farmers with it.  Those winds, as they whirled and tore at our gardens, have sucked most of the remaining moisture from our soil - Jamieson Creek no longer sings to us, but merely seeps down between exposed banks and tree roots, creeping towards the falls, and Lake Burragorang beyond.

It wasn't long before the smoke followed the dust, heralding the onset of one of our nastier fire seasons.  The Valley on The Mountain is so far unscathed by fire, apart from one escaped campfire in the scrub behind the lake.  The warnings of Catastrophic fire weather kept many of the usual tourists back down in The City on The Plain, and many of our local people decided it would be a good place to spend a couple of days, too.  We were fortunate that only a few, small fires broke out in the Blue Mountains this week, though they kept the firefighters and residents busy enough.

From any high point around here, in recent days, the huge clouds of smoke from the Gospers Mountain fire have made a startling curtain across the northern horizon.  Other days, The City has been invisible in a pall of smoke and air pollution, and I am glad my lungs are operating in a different part of the atmosphere.

My writer's conscience, despite the lack of blog posts in recent months, had not been bothering me as much as usual - this partly because of the progress I am making with the final edit of my current attempt at a novel, and partly because keeping the gardens alive, reconstructing an ageing and decrepit deck, tearing down old fencing, and filling vacant spots at the library have all but drowned it out.  Until now, when, suddenly, it has been awakened by circumstance.

With the worsening of the fire season has come the regular barrage of toxic politicking and trolling that inevitably launches itself at the throat of any who dare ask or suggest the question "Is this weather/fire danger/drought being made worse by climate change?"

Some of the nastier and loonier responses have come from our former Deputy Prime Minister, Barnaby Joyce, who dismissed the deaths of two people in the fires with the observation that they "most likely voted Green" - a comment that carried with it the unspoken implication that their deaths were thus their own fault for supporting the wrong political party. 

Could he say with certainty that they voted that way?  Well, no, but it doesn't matter because Barnaby was off on a new tangent, blaming the bushfires on changes to the sun's magnetic fields.  Does he really believe any of this nonsense? 

Probably not, but it serves to stir up certain parts of his support base for whom labels like "Greenie" or "Conservationist" or "National Parks" are triggers guaranteed to induce a frothing, apoplectic rage at those "others", while making sure that they are more likely to vote for Barnaby in the future.

Across all forms of media, but especially the internet, the old straw men are set up and knocked over, as the trolls manufacture posts to "prove" that the fires are all the fault of the "Greenies" who have obstructed all forms of hazard reduction until the inevitable firestorms erupt - or are the fault of the National Parks and Wildlife Service, who have "locked up" the Parks to prevent any burning off occurring in them.

My experience is the opposite of those lies.  I did twenty years of service with the VBFB and RFS, as well as some paid firefighting with NP&WS, in a rural area that consisted of entangled farms, State Forest, weekend properties, and National Parks.

My brigade had a large membership, and was one of the busiest in the shire - indeed, one of the busiest in the Hunter Valley.  We regularly worked with NP&WS on hazard reductions in and around the adjacent National Parks, and they helped us whenever they could - despite being perpetually understaffed.  The claims that no HRs happen in Parks is just completely untrue.  NP&WS not only planned these things well ahead, but talked to us about what they hoped to acheive.

As for those detestable Greenies that so quickly raise Barnaby and Co's blood pressure - many members of my brigade and the neighbouring brigades espoused Green or conservationist political views.  Did they vote Green?  I wasn't looking over their shoulders at the ballot box, but some of them did hand out Green how to vote cards, so probably.

The brigades in our sector were peopled by people - community members - of various genders - male and female, straight and gay - young (16) and old (up to almost 80) - from a variety of ethnic, cultural, belief, and non-belief backgrounds - and from all across the educational and social spectrum of Australian society.

They were all, no matter what political or personal labels some might like to pin on them, there when needed, sweating in the smoke and flames and dust and diesel fumes, risking their very lives for the sake of the community, near and far.  They attended small hazard reductions, huge blazes, long campaign fires, out of area responses to fire, flood, and other emergencies.

They attended house fires, air crashes, car crashes - some fatal, truck fires, flood rescues, and looked for lost bushwalkers and missing children.  They cut steps down steep hillsides to help the ambulance teams reach motorcycle riders who had unexpectedly parted ways with their machines and ended up in the bottom of a gulley, down among the thorns and death adders.

They worked all night with their own chainsaws, as well as the ones from the fire tankers, clearing away hundreds of fallen trees along the main road and private driveways, checking on the safety of every resident in the district, after a tornado carved a 40 km long scar through the forests and farms of our area.

Those "Greenies" that Barnaby and his ilk so despise and condemn lived in the bush too - they turned out with the rest of the brigade (Green, Liberal, Labor, Democrat, Country Party, or donkey voter) to carry out hazard reductions and other fire mitigation preparations, and they looked after their own properties and kept an eye on their neighbours welfare too.

When politicians write off people or classes of people by applying a sneering label to them, they are treating the whole community with contempt, and dodging their own obligations as elected members of our governing class to work for the benefit of all our people - not merely for themselves.

Revival

Has it only been three weeks since last I posted here?  To my writing conscience it feels like it has been months that a quiet little voice has been trying to push its way through the hubbub that has been life of late, demanding that I do what I had committed to do, and publish each week.  That little voice, though, was not strong enough to drown out the other jobs that were calling for attention- some scheduled, some not, some deemed urgent by me, or by other people, and most of them taking more time than originally allotted to them.

But now, after so many dry, windy, soil-baking months, proper rain has fallen on our Valley on The Mountain, and the creek, for so long timidly creeping down between bare banks towards the falls, is singing and dancing down the rocks and through the reeds.  The flush of chilly water has the Eustachius out their muddy lairs in search of mates, and the Cherax too will soon be doing the same. 

My ungrateful gardens, so long struggling despite what seemed to me to be an huge investment in time, effort, and water, have responded to the snow and rain by leaping to attention.  Blossom and leaf-bud have gone from dormant to bursting over night, and cabbages that seemed unwilling to grow at all have suddenly tripled in size.  Tardy irises that seemed ready to give up the ghost are hurling flower stems in every direction and crab apples are blessing the bees with an unexpected abundance of nectar.

Now, a walk in the garden, instead of being a way to build an ever longer list of chores to be done, is a brilliant, scented, soothing blessing of what is, and inspiration for the future. 

Though that list of things to do is still there, I guess - so back to the editing..........

Rivulets of Gold

Despite recent snowfalls, this has been the driest winter I've seen here in our little valley on the mountain - but today the rain began falling.  As I crossed the carpark behind our little library by the pine trees I noticed this.....

My phone camera doesn't properly capture the soft gold of the pine pollen being gathered by the first runnels of water, but gives an idea of just how much pollen has drifted to the ground in the recent winds of late winter.....

Soon tiny rivers of gold were swirling across the tarmac and down the hill.  How much of it will become high protein food for all manner of worms, beetles, ants and other creatures, and how much of it will go back to the soil that the pines drew its components from, is a mystery.  Some windy days I have seen vast sheets of gold blowing from the wind-shaken pine trees beyond the creek, and it easy to imagine that many, many tons of pollen are settling all across our Blue Mountains.   I know the bees have already had their turn at this bounty, as I've seen them busy everywhere as the days grow longer.

The lichen looks happier too - at last, spring is making its entrance.....

Beyond Reason

Stop Being Reasonable is the title and main theme of a book that I have just read, written by Australian philosopher Eleanor Gordon-Smith.  She discusses the mythology about, and limits of, reason as the idealised form of human decision making and behaviour, and gives some remarkable case studies to guide our own thinking and self awareness.

Gordon-Smith was recently interviewed on the ABC regarding one of those case studies.  In what many would regard as a risky, courageous endeavour, she took her recorder and notebook and set out to walk past building sites, shopping centres, and even down that strangest of Australian places - Darlinghurst Road, Kings Cross. 

When, as so often happens to women in such locations, she was cat-called, whistled at, or propositioned by male strangers, she stopped, introduced herself, and asked them "Why?" 

The resulting answers, given in the full knowledge that they were being recorded by a woman who intended to analyse and publish, and who had the skills and qualifications to do so, were candid and disturbing, and often less than reasonable - especially if you, like me, were brought up believing in the power of human reason, and the superiority of reason over emotion.

The book delves into our ability to discern truth from falsehood, to decide which to believe or live by, and to remember accurately (or not) the course of our decision making, and the reasons we made those decisions.  As well referenced as any academic text, it is written in concise, accurate language that makes its questions and partial answers (like all good science, each question answered tends to raise many more follow-up questions) comprehensible and well worth reading.

I was going to say "enjoyable" but some of the thought processes and rationales revealed, as well as some aspects of the case studies in the book, are disturbing.  Why am I reviewing and recommending this book on a blog that is largely addressed to writing?

Because it offers some new perspectives on how and why we, and by extension, our characters think and decide and act in the ways we and they do - and the more we understand how our own minds work, the better we can understand our protagonists.

Types of Victory

This is not the first novel I have set myself to writing.  Previous efforts grew tangled and turgid, despite the simplicity and clarity of the initial concept, until, even if an ending was reached, the work as a whole seemed beyond repair or redemption.  It can make the writer's way seem a long, dark road indeed.

For several years, between short stories, drawing, gardening, family, and a host of other occupations (including paid work), and a great deal of procrastination, I have been pushing the story forward, inch by inch - occasionally even a few yards at a time - until, when I was a bit over half way through, I could suddenly see the ending clearly enough to know what territory remained between where I was and where I wanted to be.  When I arrived at that destination it was a feeling of relief as much as one of victory, but still a victory worth having.

It was an excellent moment, seeing the whole picture of the road ahead - no longer lost, but heading downhill towards a destination long sought. 

How much more wonderful is that feeling of relief that washes over you as you lean back in your chair knowing that the paragraph just laid on the page is, indeed, The End.  The Final Words on the Final Page.  Yes, I know - it isn't really over.  There is yet the second trip, and possibly third, or fourth trip still to be made across that same ground - tidying and trimming, even hacking away dense clumps of excess words.  There will be little additions needed as well, to clarify (or confuse, if that's what you want) the situation for the reader.

Then there are the spelling and grammatical errors that you really do not want present on any page when you do find an editor willing to have a look at your precious creation - nope, the journey seems far from over; and yet the relief remains.  You took an idea and a bucket full of words, scattered them across hundreds of pages - pushed and pulled at the resulting sentences and paragraphs - and so often wondered if you could really cross the finish line with something that wouldn't need consigning to the rubbish bin as soon as you got there.

Today, though, has been a different kind of victory; a victory in the form of a Second Draft complete and tidy in it's plot and style.

No feeling of relief this time, just unalloyed pleasure at the creation emerging from the raw materials.

It is a victory that suddenly makes other victories seem possible - time to go back, perhaps, to some of those other ideas that I thought so good then, and start afresh upon a new road, towards another destination.

The calendar says mid-winter, but my garden doesn't think so - despite the snow that fell a few weeks ago, and the frosts that have fallen upon us from time to time.

I emptied the compost bin a day ago, harvesting barrow loads of dark, rich compost and working it in around the young vegetables.  A good dose of water on top of that and the seedlings that had been sitting close to the ground, waiting for the next icy blast, are suddenly standing proud, enjoying the sunshine.

and the flowers are happy, too....

Meanwhile, on the far side of The City on the Plain, where the Great Eastern Firebreak begins, there is no sign of winter at all....

I suppose Winter will be back to take another swipe at our little Valley on the Mountain, but until it does, we'll keep on enjoying the balmy weather and sunshine...

The only thing that is missing from this early spring is our friend, Charlie the Copperhead snake - and I'm sure he'll be in the picture soon...

Depths and Shallows

Still waters run deep, the saying goes....  an apt warning for people standing at the edge of a river for the first time, or appproaching a new relationship. It is useful advice for fishermen contemplating how deep to set the bait beneath their float, too.

Libraries can seem still and peaceful at first glance, but the tides and currents of our community run strongly through the public spaces of our branches.  Old friends meet each other unexpectedly at the self-checking stations, or gather at the lounge by the periodical shelves for long, quiet (or not so quiet) chats and reminiscences, and new friends are discovered.

Younger children make new friends among the picture books, while pairs and groups of teens lurk on the padded benches behind the tall shelves of YA and Graphic Novels, testing the depths of relationships - actual or potential.

Solitary teens and adults line the study benches, eyes blind to the tourist-delighting views of wilderness and mountains beyond the windows next to them.  Essays are written, exams swotted for, family histories and novels are researched, plotted, and edited, and business deals done.

Much of it is done sotto voce, but every now and then there is a crescendo of laughter or anger, or the bass rumble of a snore as a weary reader nods off to sleep.  Toddlers run between shelves and parents, loudly proclaiming their discovery of an exciting DVD or book.  Children's story times are full of song, clapping, and laughter, while children's craft and art sessions produce remarkable feats of effort, creativity, and concentration - followed by loud pride as the results are displayed for parents or grandparents.

Sometimes parents sit in neutral corners of the children's area, and the only traffic between them is the pitter patter of little feet, or occasional, quietly sad or bitter glances.

Our patrons drift in and out, turning up unexpectedly at a small branch when they are normally found at head office, or vice versa.  Book clubs and writers groups blossom, and sometimes wither, plans are made, and politics discussed.  Given the fractured state of politics in Australia today, the discourse in our libraries is remarkably polite and thoughtful - but perhaps that is due to the innate respect most people still have for the remarkable institution that is the library.

As the current of Mountains life swirls through the shelves, around the photocopiers and printers, and across the circulation and reference desks, the librarians are in the midst of the flow, directing traffic, answering questions, and assisting with technology.  We know better than any just how deep this river is, as we catch glimpses and hints of the vast and varied interests, hopes, dreams, desires, fantasies, trials, and tribulations of those it sweeps through our doors.

Next time you feel you've lost contact with humanity, or the world at large, find a comfortable spot in your local library and sit quietly, or amble for a while among the shelves.  Keep your ears and eyes open - serendipity lives in libraries, and all the best people turn up there sooner or later - including you.

The Final Miles

I did say, when first posting on this blog, that writing would be one of the main topics, but lately I have been diverted by flowers, birds, and weather; escaping, possibly, from that part of the writing process I have always found most difficult - polishing the first draft into something that might be worthy of showing to a publisher.

Could that be the attraction of short stories, especially when done in a rush, as per time-limited, prompt based, writing group exercises?  The idea appears - a spark in the dark - and flares like a freshly struck match.  The words pour from the end of the pen, and, minutes later, it is done.  A story sits, entire, on a few sheets of paper.

Complete in itself, it can still benefit from a half an hour of revision - of shifting or cutting words, pulling synomyms from the depths of memory to shift the tone of the writing to better match the story's content.

But a novel.........  after that first spark has faded, and the work has been laid down on the desk to sleep for the night, the spark has to be rekindled the next day, and the day after.  What a victory it is when finally, after so many distractions and side-trips have been negotiated, the first draft rests, complete.

"Put it aside for a while" recommend so many of the books and courses on this topic - and you do, but lurking at the back of your mind are the little discrepancies, anomalies, and contradictions that you know, or suspect, have crept into the narrative as the original idea unfolded from seed to fully grown shrub.  Eventually the author is going to have look again at the tangles and confusion that have crept in as ideas, plot twists, and new characters attached themselves to the original sprout.

Which branches are true grafts, and which merely mistletoe, sucking life from the original?  Where to prune?  Where to twist and redirect so as to let in more light, and where to add extra shade?

And all the while the author is living still in that wider world - the one full of people, politics, and incidents that are calling out for their share of the author's attention.  Many will repay the time they steal with fresh inspiration and source material for new stories.......   and there's the rub.  The world contained in that first draft requires much repair and fine tuning, and all the while, other possible worlds are crying out for space on their own fresh, clean pages.

A friend of mine, years ago, would respond to my harried cries of "I haven't got time!" with a stern admonishment "Well, make time!"  Easier said than done, I sometimes said, but that got me nowhere - it was up to me to decide and act on my priorities. 

How do people manage to live busy lives and still achieve creative goals?  How do you?

Sublime Stillness

Still moments are revelatory moments.  Standing in the sunshine on my front veranda basking in the warmth of a mid-winter afternoon, the small movements of the world around me came into focus.

A Magpie slow-stalking prey amid the grass and fallen leaves - slight shivers of Jonquil flowers and shimmering Oak leaves as a chill breeze tries to impose winter on an afternoon too balmy to pay attention to the calendar - and a miniature ocean of waves in the bird bath.

Today the little pond was dancing as tiny waves met and became, so briefly, bigger waves.  Even when the breeze was stilled, the echoes of its passing could be seen on top of the water - a living version of what I found when I walked past it only a few very frosty mornings.  Then, the waves were even bigger, but poised, unmoving, as if time had ceased.

This afternoon, it felt like watching my own tiny ocean - that morning, the stillness gifted me my own tiny ice flow.  All it needed was a penguin or two....

Sounds in the Silence

Away from our beloved Mountains for a week, we couldn't resist the chance to regain some altitude, and drove to the top of Mount Vincent, one of the highest points between Coopernook and Lansdowne, north of the Manning River.  It was an interesting drive, often at little more than walking pace, through damp gullies and up steep, rocky ridges - always surrounded by soaring tree trunks.

We did so because my wife's mum and aunts had told many fond tales of their childhood days at Langley Vale, a village now vanished, that once thrived near the Langley Bros Timber Mill, on the Lansdowne River.  The men of the family had worked at the mill, or cut timber for it, and the children had walked for miles across neighbouring farms and followed the old Langley Vale Tramway up through the forested gullies and ridges to picnic on the rocky heights of Mt Vincent.

The first thing that struck us was the view.  Vast sweeps of farmland and forested ridges, cut through by slow winding rivers, spread out to the south and near west.  Further out to the west, mountain ranges framed the sky, while north west soared the jagged remnants of old volcanoes, now clothed in temperate rain forest.  Even northeast, the ocean view was partially obscured by a sudden mountain. 

Distant towns, and the city of Taree were tiny specks in the vista, and a long white line of surf marked the edge of Australia and the beginning of the Pacific Ocean.

The second, notable thing was not the silence, but the sounds we could hear coming to us from miles away - cows bellowing in paddocks half a kilometre below and several kms away - the siren of an ambulance - first heard while it was still ten kms away, drawing nearer until it stopped somewhere in the village of Lansdowne.  A dog barked, and we looked down to see a tiny black speck, far below, helping its master muster cattle.

Though we live in the middle of the Blue Mountains National Park, in one of the little towns threaded like shiny beads along the Great Western Highway, and thus imagine we are in a quiet place, the silence further out, away from the surf-like roar of highways and main roads, and the accumulated hum and grumble of myriad airconditioners, mowers, cars, stereos, and businesses, is at a different order of magnitude.

Most humans now live in an ocean of sound unlike anything that has existed for most of the history of the human race - back in the village, sitting in the sun on the front verandah of the aunt's house, I was privy to every conversation in houses a hundred metres away, to the half-cocked first crowing of a young rooster on another block, the distant conversation of cattle and farm dogs, and the many birds that patrolled the yards and gardens in their constant search for food, shelter, and company.

 Silence can seem a distant memory if too many of these guys are about, though.

That I could hear  all these things so clearly (despite old ears battered by decades of violent noises and now awash in the cricket like tones of tinnitus) is testament to the amount of noise we now inflict upon ourselves and the world around us.

We adapt to the background noise after a while, just as our noses adapt to ambient smells, and our eyes to the light available.  Yet even as we adjust our perceptions, and filter out the input our brain classifies as least important, we are still buffetted by it - often to the point of significant physical and psychological stress. 

So, when you feel the need to wander among the trees, or to sit on a rock and listen to the water tumbling downstream, or to luxuriate in the crackling warmth of a campfire, far from the hustle and bustle, perhaps you are not, as some would have it, being self indulgent.  At some deeper level, you are seeking what you need for the sake of your own wellbeing.

One Distant Summer..

It's cold here in the Valley on The Mountain, now that the first snowfall has chilled the soil and left the door open for the Antarctic winds to sweep through the bare trees and search out every draughty chink in the house, so I will warm myself by taking a trip down memory's winding track to a warmer, older place, decades and miles away.......

One hot, dry, dusty Wollombi afternoon I was working behind the bar at the Tavern - apart from the Post Office, the only business then functioning in the village.  A dozen or so locals - blue singlets, tattered denim, old sleeveless flannelette shirts, battered Akubras or greasy John Deere caps - had been perched on stools along the bar for a couple of hours, steadily sinking schooners of Tooheys, or tumblers of bourbon and coke.

They had settled into a monotonous, repetitive, mutual gripe session on the many faults and general uselessness of the Wollombi Valley Progress Association, its past efforts, its current members, and its announced policies.

The policies had been announced recently because this was the afternoon of the WVPA Annual General Meeting, and all seven of its long serving, stalwart members were across the road and up the hill, in the Wollombi Community Hall,  poring over minutes, proposals, scotch finger biscuits and cups of tea.

Almost all of those stalwarts came from the old local families - the ones whose surnames adorned road signs and map locations - and had been the backbone not only of the Progress Association since its founding, but also the local P&C Associations for decades, and the Country Party for what seemed like centuries, not to mention being the mainstay of the monthly cattle sales at the Wollombi Saleyards.  Most of them were now well into their seventies, and had long since seen kids and grandkids grow to adulthood and move away from the Valley in search of better paid work.

As I poured another round of beers for the group holding court at the centre of the long bar, I realised that I was hearing for at least the third time the gripes and complaints that had commenced the session, almost two hours earlier - possibly the fifth or sixth time, but it hadn't occurred to me to keep count, until then. I realised that fleeing the turmoil and venality of the big smoke for a quiet life in the bush had not actually taken me away from the annoyance of politics after all.  The stage was smaller, the issues more parochial, and the style and costumes a lot dustier than I had known in the slick eateries of The City, or the glitzy, dingy streets of The Cross, but it was still the same old script.

I asked if any of them knew how many people were at the AGM.  The response was a mix of blank looks and shrugs, so I pressed on.  Had any of them been members, or attended meetings?  A few of the blank looks took on a resentful edge, as some of the soberer minds began to discern the course I was plotting.

The current members have been there for a very long time, I pointed out - which drew wry smiles and nods of agreement.  Words like "fossils" and "old farts" entered the conversation, and someone said "tired"

Yep - "tired" is what I had heard some of the old people in that hall say, too.  A few of the drinkers looked surprised.  In fact, I told my captive audience, some of those tired old timers have told me that they would love new members to take over the Progress Association so they could relax, or even give it away altogether.

Shoulders dropped, eyes were cast downwards, and chins tucked in as every beer glass at or near the bar was raised to pursed lips.  I pointed out the numerical advantage held by the group of drinkers.

"If you all walked up the hill to the community hall now and paid your membership" I said "there would be five more of you than there are of them - you could take charge, and make the Association do what you want"

There was a sour silence that was broken only by the scraping of boot soles on the slate floor or the footrail of the bar.  At last, one voice spoke, causing a ripple of nodding heads.

"It's too hot today - maybe next year" said one voice while another said "too busy" and a general chorus of assent was muttered into glasses as they were raised again

"Another round" was the final verdict, and the revolution was over before it began.

That was the better part of forty years ago, but Australian voters seem to have taken that tavern meeting for a template - I wonder if we will ever change.

We need to put down our glasses, or our screens, and head up the hill to take a grip on our system, because, unlike that Progress Association, with its tired crew of well intentioned old-timers, our political scene seems now to be firmly in the grip of an entirely opposite type of character, driven more by ruthless self interest than ethical principle or benevolence - and they are not tired of the power they are wielding, or the benefits they are taking for themselves and their mates.

A Dawn Surprise

Winter has come to our little Valley on The Mountain at last - we woke before sunrise to soft falling snow.

As the light grew, the rain set in, and a few hardy locals set out for the village.....

The snow and ice didn't stop the trains, but many of the roads from here out to the west are closed...

I approached my garden with trepidation, but my brave little cabbages and baby pea plants were standing their ground....

Even as Winter finally makes itself felt, Spring's first messengers have arrived.....

Contemplative Days

The brilliant sky and warm sunshine would have me think it is Summer....

...... but a deliciously cool breeze, the absence of bushfire haze, and the colour in the leaves...

.....says Autumn.  The Orange tree agrees........

..... that Winter is coming.  The camellias also claim that the frost and the snow should be here soon..... 

........ but the little flock of ducklings keep finding Spring pastures on my lawn .....

......... while the river just keeps rolling along....

........ towards the ocean.

Quiet Moments and Seasonal Surprises

When the tides and currents of human acts and decisions make the river of my life more turbulent than I wish to cope with, I can always retreat to the safety of the beach that is my garden.  There I can lean on a fence post with one elbow, a hoe or rake in hand, and rest.  If I am seen to be still, importunious spectators are likely to assume I am busy planning my next task, and leave me in peace a little longer. Busy can be good - tranquil can be better.  If I had been busy the other morning I would have not heard the soft peeping that told me the population of our little plot had suddenly burgeoned.

Why did our resident Black Ducks decide that Autumn was the right time to hatch and raise another clutch of ducklings?  Are they early, or late?  Spring, or late Winter, is the more usual time.  Still, there they were, grazing on a lawn that should have been mowed, but thankfully had been left in favour of jobs higher up the list.  Next time I feel driven to mow I will consider first who else might prefer it lush and green.

I tried not to disturb them, but even a prolonged gaze from me was enough to make Daphne usher her clutch back to the safety of the stream....

.... and then to the snug solitude of the far bank....

Hours later, having allowed myself a quiet moment in the front garden, I was fortunate to see Daphne lead her little flock out the gate, across the road, and into the creek beyond - intent, it seemed, of moving to the larger waters and deeper reed beds of the lake upstream......

They made it to the lake ok, but chose the wrong day to seek peace and privacy on the broader waters.  That evening crowds such as I have not seen before descended upon the shores to celebrate Lanterns on the Lake....

The sunset was lovely, but the crowds too much for a mother duck seeking solitude and safety - by the next morning she and her little flotilla were back in the waterholes beside our garden, slipping out of the shelter of the overhanging ferns and branches to graze the lawn when morning and evening shadows were long, and silence reigned.  I hope Autumn stays long enough for the little ones to grow large enough to survive the Winter that their kind do not normally face.

Though the leaves are turning red and gold, the roses bloom still, the camellias are flourshing and spreading carpets of pink and white, while the leaves of next season's daffodils, narcissus, and irises, are all bursting upwards. 

Even the rosemary is flowering again, just in time for Anzac Day, and remembrance of deeds long ago, whose ripples still disturb our reflections, a century on.

A Ripple Here, a Breaking Wave There

Cloudy, autumn, Blue Mountain dawns are, in our front yard, a melange of almost every green on the pallette, leavened by the dull greys and browns of bark and twig, and one brief glimpse of the white house beyond the creek, on the other side the little valley.  Later, the sun will push through even thick cloud and pick out the late roses, and second blooming of the rosemary, but, for now, the shadows and muted colours allow easy concealement for both the hunter and the hunted.

As I stood at the top of the steps, assessing what level of clothing would be adequate for a walk to the village, an anomalous fleck of brightness jiggled into view at ground level.  Brillliant white, bobbing up and down,  crossing the grass (not lawn, it hasn't been mowed for a while, and is only kept in check by the tyres of family who are staying for a while) towards me.

Changing focus from sky to earth, I find our resident Black Ducks waddling towards me.  One has picked up a fallen Cockatoo feather - small, squarish, and ever so white - and is waving it at me while its mate mutters quietly about their need for breakfast.  The feather is dropped in the rush, the moment I toss a few little scraps of (wholemeal) bread onto the grass.

How long do these birds live?  I've looked up a variety of sites and reference works and so far haven't been able to find an answer.  We met them first, eleven and a half years ago, soon after we arrived at our new home in the Valley on top of the Mountain.  I had walked to the letterbox and was standing there, checking the mail, when a soft, repetitive mutter intruded on my reading.  A duck was standing a few feet behind me, looking up, addressing me in his own language.  I don't know where he was while I crossed the yard - there was no flutter of wings to say he had flown in from the creek, so I must have walked past him.  I could hear my grandfather's voice, decades ago..

"Lucky it wasn't a Brown Snake, lad, it would'a got you"  It was a reminder to look about while I walked - what else had I missed?

He followed me back to the house, so I took the hint and threw some bread onto the lawn - he had made it clear he wasn't leaving the verandah otherwise.  A day or two later, he was back - with a friend.  Not long after that, we were introduced to seven fluffy ducklings.  I am guessing that the previous residents had been feeding them, and, despite the house having been empty for some months, they hadn't forgotten what might be possible, if the right questions were asked.

Similarly, it didn't take long for our Magpie Landlords to arrive and let us know what rent would be acceptable to them - and the King Parrot that landed on my shoulder with no warning was another sign of my place in the order of things.  Our new beginning in the mountains was, in the lives of the feathered locals, a continuation - a new, if similar, chapter in a longer story.  Those birds had been dealing with humans for a long time, and not only the owners of this house.  Our Magpie friends had a cafe-crawl that included several other houses along our street, as well as the butcher in the village on the other side of the railway line.

Before we had met many of the local humans, the birds were already greeting us and letting us know where we stood in their world.  It is a world that their ancestors occupyied and shared with humans for a very, very long time.  Only thirty years ago, or forty at the most, this ground was a swamp full of paperbark trees and reeds, frogs and snakes - do these ducks remember those times?  They would have raised many ducklings in such a place. 

The Cockatoos would remember - they are said to live seventy years, perhaps more, and the more I see of them, the easier it is to believe that they have a language, culture, and an oral history.  That would mean it is only just over three and a half Cockatoo lifetimes since Governor Phillip set his convicts and marines to work on the shores of Port Jackson.

It could be as much as a thousand Cockatoo lifetimes since the ancestors of the Gundungurra people first drank from the stream that flows past our garden.  I wonder what stories the Cockatoos have been able to tell each other about this land, and the changes that various people have wrought upon it, even as the ice ebbed and flowed, and the oceans rose and fell.

All who came before us left their marks, and created ripples that reach across time and space to affect the here and now.  Ripples seem tiny things, but when enough arrive at a conjunction, a wave can rise, and break - it can freshen a pond, or crash upon a shore and uproot what was standing. 

Have you wondered, as you paddle your canoe down the stormier reaches of the river of life, which choices of your own have put you where you are?  Most of us do - yet there are waves in that maelstrom that grew from the ripples of the decisions of others, made in other times and places, near and far, just as the ripples of our own making have gone far from our sight, to shores we may never see.  One wave might threaten to pull us under - another might wash us onto a welcoming shore - the voyage, one way or the other, is sure to be interesting.

I stood, mattock in one hand on this sunny morning, and contemplated my vegetable garden. I looked at the waves of pumpkin leaves and froth of summer grass seed heads that were breaking across my once tidy beds, and remembered the source of some of the ripples that led to this verdant tempest.  Hurrying onto rain-soaked steps while wearing old, smooth-soled shoes was one splash that is still making itself felt - one moment of carelessness, followed by months of consequences.  I can still only weild the mattock one handed, so it is going to take time to get the gardens back where I want them.  The winter frosts will probably do more clearing and weeding than me.

Still, it could be worse - we escaped the fire season that was anticipated for The Mountains, unlike so many other parts of Australia (shhhh!  I know - it is only the beginning of March - there is still April to go yet)

An Absent Voice

When I set out writing this novel I began writing at the point that the protagonist is arriving, with family members, at a place he's never been before, noticing things and people that soon have him drawing on his years as an investigator.  As interesting as I found that scene, it was slow paced, and the protagonist was arriving after the incident that forms the core of the story.  Most of the people in town already know something has happened, and at least one may know all the facts. My protagonist is a late-comer (to me, as well as the story) and an outsider, and not everyone will be happy with his involvment.

I realised that I didn't know all the details of that incident, either.  I needed to write it down - to follow the thread of the narrative and see where it took me.  Who done it, and why?  So, I put pen to paper and set out.  A few pages into this I realised that there were people who had witnessed parts of what happened that night, even if they didn't immediately realise it. 

Though they wouldn't be entering the awareness of the protagonist for hours or even days, I had to write their stories, too, so I could understand what their relationship with the protagonist and other characters would be.  I ended up with four "preludes" to the opening chapter that I first wrote.  This is the one about the the character and the moments around which the story is centred.  It has been trimmed, refined, re-written, and trimmed again, and now feels like it should be the opening pages of the book.  What do you think?

SHORT CUT:

Perry laughed as he urged his utility up the steep, overgrown bush track; narrow escapes always filled him with an exultant energy.  The corrugations shook the Hilux sideways across the gravel surface towards the deep, rocky drain on the left.  He eased off the pedal and fought the shuddering steering wheel until the bonnet pointed up the centre of the track again, and then shoved the accelerator to the floor.  Driving with his window down, shivering and shirtless, he was listening through the wind in his ears for the sound that had sent him on this mad dash; the distinctive, burbling roar of a home modified exhaust, unlike any other car in the district.

A few minutes earlier that echoing, V-8 rumble had roused him from a warm bed and sent him running, boots, jeans, and shirt held close, into the cool night air. He had vaulted into his ute and made a crazy, lightless dash down the potholed wheel ruts that led from the house to the dirt road winding along the valley floor. Moonlight and memory got him to the road in one piece, just as the glow of head-lights silhouetted the trees on his right.

The roar of that exhaust was loud and clear as Perry threw the Hilux hard left and stamped on the accelerator, wanting desperately not to be snared by the approaching headlights.  Sharp white beams pierced the billowing dust cloud outside the farm gate as the Hilux fishtailed round the first bend.  He put his foot down and charged into the dappled shadows of the Eucalypts, hoping the kangaroos and wombats had the good sense to stay out of his way.  Behind him, the V-8 faltered briefly, and then roared even louder.

Three kilometres up the valley, Perry found the entry to his short cut and swung hard right.  The moonlight was enough for the pale, sandy road, but the narrow track up the forest-darkened gulley was invisible.  He flicked the parking lights on and lifted his foot a little.  That noisy exhaust was echoing louder again, though his rear-view mirror remained dark.  As he neared the head of the gulley, where the road hair-pinned right, a hint of a glow appeared, far behind; he took the bend fast, sliding on the loose surface, and his mirror was dark again..

Too late, he saw the cluster of potholes that stretched, trench like, across the track, black craters on a dark surface.  He hit the brakes, but the Hilux slammed into the sharp edge at the far side.  It bounced and lurched sideways towards dark tree trunks at the road's edge.  Perry coaxed it back into line and accelerated again, laughing as he realised that the low-slung vehicle behind him would never get through that last obstacle. 

Near misses piqued Perry's sense of adventure, but this one was too close.  A few minutes earlier, he would have been fatally oblivious to that warning rumble.  There could still be consequences in coming days, but Perry could talk his way out of almost any corner – especially over a beer or two. 

He hit the 'go' button on the CD player and began tapping the steering wheel as Highway to Hell thumped out of the speakers.  He turned his headlights on once he had put a forested ridge between himself and his pursuer, and pushed the ute as fast as the rutted, pot-holed track would allow, savouring the cooling tingle of the night air on his bare shoulder and chest, and tasting the joy of another little victory.

His headlights barely reached fifty metres ahead; just enough at this speed to see a roo or wombat if one leapt out of the shadowed undergrowth, but not enough to avoid hitting it.  The Hilux rattled and shuddered its way across the corrugations and protruding rocks, charging up a flickering, tree-lined tunnel of light.  Perry stood on the brakes again, surprised by a hairpin bend he'd thought was still a hundred metres ahead.  The ute slid onto its new course as Perry urged it towards the next hairpin – the third of five that would see him up onto the ridge, and closer to the little used trail that was his short cut home.  Near the top, he swung right onto a larger track – one used by the timber cutters and trail bike riders, mostly.

The forest thinned in that dryer country along the top of the ridge. A wallaby darted away from the noise and light as he began his charge down along the shallow saddle.  Perry braked carefully, looking for its mates, and the turn off that he knew should appear on his right any second.  It would be nice to be home before anyone tried to ring him. 

When the gap in the trees appeared, Perry braked hard and swung the nose of the vehicle sharply onto its new course. He had to fight for control as the tail swung out too far.  The left wheels found the soft edge before he had the Hilux straightened out, but an ominous, flapping growl announced that one of the back tyres was flat.  He pushed on up the slope to the level stretch beyond the first bend as the metal rim began to scrape on the gravel. 

The Hilux wobbled to a stop at the edge of the track as Bon Scott belted out the final phrases of Girls got Rhythm – the music died just before the engine did.  Perry slammed both hands on the steering wheel, then his forehead, and cursed.  He turned off the lights and listened, but apart from the creaking of cooling motor, and the soft, rhythmic thump of a departing kangaroo, the bush was silent.  He reached across to the passenger seat for his jeans, and began to dress, as a distant owl declared its presence.

The full moon was climbing higher as he jacked up the corner of the ute and glared at the shredded tyre.  The wheel nuts clung to the studs, screeching with each tug on the wheel brace.  It was the sort of noise people would hear miles away.  The spare fought with him as well, reluctant to leave its hiding place under the tray.  Months of dust had built up in every thread and track, jamming everything that should move freely.  Sweat dripped from his nose, and trickled down his ribs beneath his shirt, cooling to iciness by the end of its journey.

The spare, when he pulled it free, was flat.  He dragged it out, stood it up, and dropped it again.  It thumped lifelessly to the ground, and Perry gave it a good kick.  Flat as a tack and he'd left his compressor and tools at home before embarking on this night's adventure.

He looked up, startled by the faint whine of an engine, but the sound was gone as quickly as it had come.  He stood for a couple of minutes, listening and watching and working through his limited options.  He used this track because no one else did.  Now he needed a phone or an air pump, and neither looked likely.  Four hundred metres to the Ironstone Ridge track, and then a couple more kilometres pushing his spare tyre, would see him reach a couple of cabins perched on their isolated blocks on the spine of the ridge. 

He'd scouted these shacks two years ago, fruitlessly, he thought at the time, the day after a dance at the community hall.  He was certain, though, that one had a phone connected, and the other had a fairly well stocked workshop, so a compressor, or even a foot pump, was a chance.  He stood the spare up on its edge and gave it a push.  Half an hour later he wondered why he hadn't just driven to the cabins on the ruined tyre.  It would only have ruined the rim, after all; a very expensive rim, as he recalled.  Perry shrugged, cursed the thrifty genes his distant, Highland ancestors had bequeathed him, and kept pushing the flat tyre.

An hour later, he was still looking for the driveway to the first of the shacks.  How fast can a man walk when juggling a large flat tyre along an uneven dirt road?  Not as fast as he had expected, and uphill was easier, it turned out, than trying to restrain the wheel on the downhill sections. The skin on his palms was raw and stinging and his shoulders and back were threatening to go on strike.

Finally, a trace of pale sand shone faintly between two trees on his right.  He stopped in the middle of the moonlit road and stared into the dark tunnel. Fifty metres further along the road, he could see a glimmer of white painted rocks that marked another property entrance.  Perry held the tyre upright with one hand and searched his memory, trying to remember which one had the shed full of tools. 

Both shacks huddled under the trees, fifty metres from the track, but the moonlight was glinting on something metallic part way down the driveway closest to him.  Would someone be here on a Thursday?  He straightened as well as he could and rubbed the small of his back before moving on. 

The tyre had rolled only a metre or so when an engine roared into life.  Blinding white light stabbed out of the driveway as a vehicle accelerated straight at him.  Perry turned and let the tyre fall as he ran towards the trees at the far edge of the track.   The hard surface of the track changed to soft soil and leaves, and low prickly bushes clutched at his legs as the light and noise surged towards him, and gravel crunched as the vehicle skidded to a stop just short of the fallen spare wheel.

The voice that yelled his name was not one he wanted to hear.