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.....