November 2004

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Outside it is dark and the headlights shoot like spears through the night, illuminating the thin country roads of our twilight drive. A dead rabbit lay frozen, centre of the road, and we stop to admire its fragility. It hasn’t been hit but appears to have laid down to die, legs stretched and body taut. Perhaps she was taking her last leap, I imagine, a final flight with life. I place her dead body amongst the long grass, stare into her eyes and watch them twinkle in the headlights. On this narrow road there is nothing but us and our cool breath that billows and floats upwards like an invisible SOS sign. Inside the car Madonna plays and I wonder what it is that surrounds us in this fictitious land, if people stay hidden in the dark and watch us talk to deceased rabbits.

Driving through the night I realise that this is what my mother used to do. “Shall we go for a drive?” she would ask, rhetorically. I would put my coat on that would eventually become my pillow and hop into our red BMW. I think these times were as important to me as they were for my mother – an excuse to escape her mind, take in the freshness of nature that lay just beyond our home. Roaming through the back roads of the forest we would sometimes appear at the top of a quiet hill over-looking grandma’s. We would never stop, just peer over the hill to see if she may be in, and then drive on further. I would wait until this point of the drive before I would let myself fall asleep. In the warmth and security of the car I would lay my coat down on the back seat and curl into the foetal position. Here I felt safe. Here I knew my mother would let nothing but peace upon me. Driving through these woods tonight, I see that her intentions are the same until this day.

Our headlights peer over a steep hill of the golf course, engine quiet and the two of us following the beams that steer off into the distance. Acceleration and soon we’re almost sunken into the green, lights harsh against the flag. We giggle, both knowing that we shouldn’t be here. She lay on the grass wrapped in a wet white sheet, the sound of Bjork’s Hyperballad behind us that echoes lightly through the desolate nightscape. Here in these shadows there is laughter and fear, serenity and coldness, an episode with nature so far removed from what I have come to know…

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I’m going away for another few days of Country Retreat. When I return I want to feel refreshed, new, I want to have found myself(!). There shall be semi-naked golf course photos, much a conversation down by the river and catching up with a friend that I never want to lose. Back Friday.

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Your trousers are wet and the damp is creeping from around your ankles to just below your knees. It snakes its way with time, inviting a cool chill into your skin. You’ve walked so far today that the soles of your feet ache, and your eyes sting from the evening’s cool air. You pour stories over beautifully crafted cocktails and wrap your hands in your knotted scarf, wishing you could sleep in the cocoon of warmth that he offers you.

Under tonight’s blanket of stars it feels as if this city is collapsing. It is falling to its knees around you and you stand here – centre stage. Fragments of memories shatter like a broken mirror and leave you staring up at the sky, a void so deep, it is an abyss that envelops you.

You do silly things like count your footsteps home, or sit in lonely churches when you know that God is Dead. You’ll hold his arm all day and fall asleep on his sofa, and realise that this should be happening with someone else.

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I’m stuck. Does it get easier?

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