Lou Sanz

Coming home from a gig on Saturday night realising that if I managed to make it home by 9pm The Bill would be in full throttle and even with my comprehensive knowledge of back-story I’d struggle to keep up, I stood waiting for the illustrious No 19 tram. Not to worry, I wasn’t alone. I had the luck of keeping company with a couple of teenagers/burgeoning football team and when I say a couple I mean not enough to terrify me into a gang bang, but enough to have quite clearly justified their purchase of two slabs of Jim Bean & Coke.

Not that I’m a snob in the traditional sense, but yes I will admit, a couple of slabs of some sort of pale ale and these young men would have easily transformed in my eyes from just sex offenders to alleged sex offenders.

One of them spat in front of me or threw up (I’m finding it harder and harder to tell these days) before asking me how my night was, well that’s what I thought ‘…avin a good night…cat…apper…penis’ meant.

Having promised myself not to get herpes in this lifetime I stepped back from him and then watched as he tried to chase a car packed with ‘the ladies’ down Sydney Rd egged on by his friends in a way a dog might chase a car, a dog whose parents paid for it’s private school education.

I noticed a girl in the mix drinking a Red Bull with her hair pulled back into a sensible ponytail. She watched the idiots around her and for a moment I was reminded of a young me. One of the boys kept pulling her hooded sweat, trying to drag her over to him like a caveman but to her credit she spurned his advances as he tried to whisper something in her ear. She pushed him away.

‘No Tony, I’m not giving you a hand job.’

You go sister I thought as I smiled to myself.

‘Last time my hand cramped and I couldn’t text for like hours and you didn’t even cum, f**k that.’

How I yearned for those curious fumbling years…

Finally the tram arrived and we all climbed on board, the teenagers by now figuring that if they sat at the back of the tram they’d come across less like drunk dickheads and more like hip urban commuters. I moved to the front as I heard a conversation about ‘how to spot a tardo’ fade into the distance.

Deciding to stand for the next few stops, I noticed an older woman staring at me and found myself wondering for a brief moment if the No 19 was the tram of choice for lesbians to cruising away their Saturday night. I didn’t have to wait long for my answer as the woman came over to me.

‘You remind me a lot of myself when I was your age.’

Now I don’t know about you but I’ve never been into the idea of hooking up with people that look me, admitting though that I was yet to come across 5’3 curvy Latino type gentlemen who couldn’t grow a decent moustache, but hey, the night was young.

‘Um, thanks’ I replied to her, not that it was a compliment she’d paid me as I looked down at her cankles.

‘Back when I was your age I tried to kill myself, didn’t manage it mind you. Just ended up alone.’

My eyes drew away from her cankles and elasticised Susanne Gray pants and I suddenly realised how sad a complete stranger could make me feel.

I didn’t know what to say and my overwhelming curiosity to ask why she hadn’t kept trying was threatening to leap out of my mouth at any moment.

‘Um…I’m sure someone loves you.’ I offered.

‘Does someone love you?’ she asked.

Ouch.

‘My parents I think.’

‘Doesn’t count.’

‘Some of my friends?’

‘Doesn’t count.’

‘What, you mean like a boyfriend or something?’

‘I knew the touch of a man once, his name was Tom. Full of cock and confidence Tom was.’

‘What happened to Tom, did he die in the war or something?’

‘The war? I’m only 37, he was only 17.It was the love that dare not speak its name. Don’t be stupid. Died in the war. No, he just changed schools. It wasn’t meant to be.’

‘That’s a shame.’ I muttered, looking at this woman, this broken woman. Why had she been so unlucky? Would I have the same fate given I once admitted to a crush on the red head from Harry Potter?

‘If you don’t mind my saying your fringe makes you looks like a guard at a women’s prison.’

Oh, this must be why no one loved her.

I pulled the cord announcing my impending stop.

‘Ok, well you have a good night then.’

‘You don’t work in a woman’s prison do you?’

‘No.’

‘Would you like to?’

‘No’

‘Ok, no harm in asking.’ And with that she started up towards the back of the tram looking to acquaint herself with some of Jim Bean fuelled football team.

As I hoped off the tram I heard her turn to the girl I’d seen earlier.

‘You remind me of myself when I was your age.’

‘I’m not licking you out or nuffin’ the girl spat back at her.

You go sister I couldn’t help but smile to myself.

I like my friends. I find it helps. However sometimes I get the distinct impression that if faced with a ravenous mega crocodile in a swamp they would throw a bucket of fish guts over me and then run for the hills watching from afar as I get torn limb from limb, stopping only to remark to each other ‘poor Lou, she’s just always in the wrong place at the wrong time.’

This thought came about after a good friend of the ‘I just met him at the gym and he was the one and now we’ve bought a split level apartment together in Woollahra and I thought I knew what happiness was but I didn’t, I was a fool on a teenagers errand because now that I’ve met the blood (his name is Ian*) that pumped through my heart, well Lou I wondered how I ever managed without it before’ variety sent me an email admonishing me for not even owning a toaster oven and highly recommending I go on a blind date with one of Ian’s friends.

A new toaster oven I could use, but a blind date, chances of that making me an evenly toasted piece of heaven smothered with Nutalex was highly unlikely and that level of certainty comes with age children, age.

I emailed her back, politely declining, telling her I’d recently bought the box set of Pugwall and I owed it to him to watch it in full over the next say month or 36 years, so she rang me.

‘Pugwall isn’t available in box set yet. I Googled it. You’re lying.’

‘It should be.’

‘This is neither the time nor the place to go into that Lou.’

‘I finished Press Gang last week.’

‘I don’t care.’

‘You wouldn’t.’

Silence.

‘He’s a very nice man Lou.’

‘I’m sure his mum finds him real nice.’

‘Really Lou? A mum joke?’

‘Technically it wasn’t really a mum joke, but granted there was an inference so I’ll give you that.’

She ignored me and to be fair I understood why.

‘Ok, so he’s nice.’

‘Yes nice and has a job. He’s not leaving someone, dating anyone else, not moving overseas, doesn’t have a harem I know of and he doesn’t dress as a clown.’

‘I’ve never dated a clown.’

‘Clowns, performers, street folk, it’s all the same from where I sit with all my financial security looking down on you.’

‘Look, I’m just really not into the idea of it at all.’

‘Just think of it like going to a Farmer’s Market and you’re the cow that needs to be milked.’

‘That analogy managed to offend me on so many levels.’

‘Good’

‘And look I’m going away in a week so now really isn’t a good time to start anything.’

‘You’re going to Sydney for a weekend.’

‘Exactly’

‘And his recent STD check came back clear and don’t panic I showed him a copy of yours.’

‘God, I should never have given you a copy.’

‘Consider it a reference check.’

‘Fine, I’ll meet him.’

Within 15 minutes of hanging up I’d received an email from him, informing me he liked going to the gym, the movies and he’d Googled me, thus the absence of questions directly relating to myself I imagined. I’m not a mad fan of Googling people. I have a weird thing about getting to know them on my own terms, not have information thrust upon me, but this doesn’t always halt the expectation from others that you’ve Googled them. Whilst dating someone it came to my attention I’d missed his birthday – oh stop throwing stones – I’d asked him on numerous occasions when it was and he wouldn’t tell me. None of this was helped when at dinner one night I asked how his week had been and he pointed out I’d missed his birthday, something that if I’d ever checked his Wikipedia entry I would’ve known…

I wrote back to email guy and said next Wednesday would be good for a coffee. He tried to up the anti to dinner but I know what I’m like after a meal and a glass/bottle of wine so I told him coffee was preferable. He wrote back saying fingers crossed they might serve nuts there. I wrote back saying that if was prone to such overwhelming bursts of hunger perhaps it best he ‘eat’ before we met up.

The Wednesday arrived and out of the blue so did my parents, fresh from an 8 week jaunt around the Mediterranean. I’d have to reschedule. I sent him a quick text explaining the unexpected events that had led to our coffee cancellation, heck I even through in some wit without trying to sound flippant. All in all it was the perfect text message, however my intended audience didn’t agree.

My phone beeped. He’d replied:

‘Hi, look I’m worried if you can’t make time for us now then what hope do we have for a future. Think about it.’

I couldn’t help but think he had a great sense of humour, so I checked.

‘Are you serious?’ I wrote back.

‘Yes. I need to know now you’re just not going to flake out on me. I really wanted to meet you but I’m started to think you don’t want the same things I want for us.’

Ok, let’s just drown the puppy in the hessian sack now. I looked around to make sure I wasn’t jilting someone at the alter and had some how become so torn from  my  own reality I hadn’t even noticed, but no, my tracksuit was still firmly on and my kitchen looked nothing like a cathedral, but the floor did need to be mopped.

I deleted his number from my phone and got out the bucket.

My phone rang, it was my friend.

‘It took a lot of leg pulling to get that guy to even agree to meet you, especially after he read your blog.’

‘And hello to you too.’

‘Don’t Lou.’

‘Sorry’ I put the bucket down.

‘He rang to say you’ve stopped responding to his messages.’

‘Yes, about 3 minutes ago I stopped responding to his messages.’

‘Is this what happens Lou? Is that why your relationships end up in the toilet faster then a uni girl’s hair extension after a smoko?’

‘For Christ’s sake, he acted like we’d agree to start working things out after having gone through a legal separation.’

‘You’d be so lucky’ my friend scoffed.

‘He’s not right in the head.’

‘A predisposition to schizophrenia is a non-issue Lou.’

‘Oh my god is it so hard to believe that I have little to no interest in getting married or moving in with someone? If and when you see me advertised on Craig’s list then maybe I’ll re-evaluate, but right now I’m fine with Pugwall and men that might not return my calls.’

She said nothing as I imagined her muting the Lifestyle Channel before coming back to me.

‘Ok, fine. I’ll just tell him you’re taking time to figure yourself out.’

‘No, just tell him his messages were inappropriate and scary and at the end of the day I prefer the company of clowns.’

‘I knew it.’

‘Yes, you know me better than I know myself.’

We hung up and I picked up the mop just as my phone beeped. It was from email guy.

‘Hey, look you take all the time you need to figure yourself out. I’ll still be here. My sister thought she was gay once too, just turned out she couldn’t eat wheat. Take care.’

And so as I deleted his message and blocked his email address whilst buttering my toast I couldn’t help but think maybe he’d end up being the one that got away and I couldn’t be more grateful for that.

Standing on my train station platform I thought about my new financial year resolution; to move away from meeting men at arts industry based events such as music festivals/ library borrowing queues / openings/ other festivals/ readings and the video store. So far it was going well; I hadn’t left my house in over a month. Eventually however, after advice on airing out my bedroom I found myself on a train station platform with a good looking young man standing next to me. Sure it was a crowded platform and one could argue there were really no other options as to where he might stand but in my mind what was important was that I thought I still had ‘it’ and I could meet people outside my ‘circle.’

He looked harmless enough, black wool jumper and jeans, not so tight as to cut off his family legacy and black worn brogues. All he was missing was a petite red-haired girlfriend with a blunt fringe, a smock with the Saver’s tag still on it, a pamphlet on alternative birth control methods and a Banksy tattoo and he would’ve looked like the guy who had everything, but all he had was a clip board and nothing else.

‘It’s very cold isn’t it?’ I turned around to see clipboard guy speaking directly to me.

‘Yes’ I replied as I hugged my large oversized duffle coat around me, a coat that could’ve past for a doona cover and of late given Melbourne’s freezing temperatures had been alternating as one. I’d had to start using the coat when I realised I’d started to develop an unnatural attachment to my hot bottle and the fact it had the ability to contour to my body shape. I only wanted one thing to do that and preferably I didn’t want it made from rubber and smelling like my grandmother.

‘Guess that’s winter for you’ he continued, allowing our natural chemistry to flow.

‘Well yeah, June is a winter month.’

‘So are August and July but not always in that order’ he pointed out to me.

‘Yeah.’

He fiddled with his clipboard.

‘Mind if I ask you some questions?’

‘No, not at all’ I responded as my ovaries began to move of their own accord – they were still there, good.

‘I noticed when you arrived at this station that you failed to validate your ticket.’

Ok, so this one wasn’t like other men I’d known, this one was a conversationalist. Tick.

‘Um, I bought a ticket.’ (I chose not to add the phrase ‘at least’)

‘Yes, I saw that but like I said I failed to see you validate your card. Is there a reason you didn’t manage to do that?’

‘I guess I just forgot.’

‘That’s why we have memory madam, it stops us from forgetting.’

‘What, you’re not making any sense’

‘But some of us don’t like memories. I don’t like all of my memories and that’s why I don’t like dogs and biscuits.’

Suddenly I felt a craving to check my inbox for any invites to something in Fed Square or at Meat Market I had forgotten to RSVP to, I mean who had financial year resolutions anyway?. .idiots did Lou, idiots…

‘Um, it’s not really any of your business why I didn’t validate my card.’

‘Today I’m making it my business’ and with that he opened up his clipboard and I couldn’t help but think this was the reason I’d never really gotten into role play.

‘Ok, fine you want to know why I don’t validate, well let’s start with the train before this one was cancelled and this train the one due to arrive is now 16 minutes late. It’s like being in a relationship with someone who ignores you at parties and then you brush it off cause you are after all barely 5’3 and he would have to look down to even notice you were there and that’s a big ask sometimes, well it’s the same as validating a ticket for a train that is running late all the time, never smiles when they see you and then surprises you by terminating early even though you already booked that holiday to Vietnam and you told him at the time that the tickets were non-refundable – if my own existence can barely be validated then I’ll be damned if I’m going to validate a ticket!’.

Clipboard guy stared at me for a moment.

‘Are you really only 5’3?’

‘I’m wearing heels today.’

‘Oh that explains it.’

He didn’t say anything for a moment.

‘I’m sorry; I didn’t mean to upset you.’

‘You didn’t upset me, I’m ok, just fine me and let’s be done with this.’

‘What makes you think I’m a transit officer?’

‘You’ve got a clipboard.’

‘Lot’s of guys carry clipboards and it doesn’t mean we work in the transit industry. I don’t even own a car, but I bet you couldn’t tell what with your eyes being so jaded by prejudice.’

‘How does owning a car have anything to do with whether I validated my ticket?’

‘From where I stand it has everything to do with it.’

I looked up at the train timetable, delayed by another 7 minutes; God must’ve still been in the bathroom tending to himself.

‘Look, don’t worry I’m not a transit cop, I’m not going to fine you even though you are pretty fine, maybe we should have a coffee sometime. My mother says coffee is good for you.’

I realised at that point me developing an almost sexual relationship with my hot bottle wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing…

‘So if you’re not here to fine me what are you doing?’

‘It’s an assignment for school.’

‘School? Like postgraduate buiness school?’..even I noticed the desperate pleading in my voice.

‘No like high school. I’m doing an assignment on ethics and we were told to approach single parents and ask them a series of questions to see if their ethics had evolved after becoming parents let down by the world.’

‘You’re in high school?’

‘Yeah, Year 11.’

‘So you’re like 17 years old.’

’16 actually.’

‘Oh good, that makes what I was thinking 20 minutes ago even more illegal.’

The train finally pulled up.

‘I’m not a single mum just so you know’ I felt I needed to point that out to him.

‘Sorry, didn’t mean to offend, it was just the fact you were carrying a doona with you.’

‘It’s my coat.’

‘Looks like a doona.’

‘Yes, I know.’

‘I like older woman you know. I get on great with my mum and she says I’ve got very soft hands.’

‘Lucky lady.’

‘She doesn’t have to be the only lucky lady in my life.’

 And with that I boarded the train and maybe, just maybe I walked away from an opportunity missed.

It’s a sad day financially and personally when you find yourself standing at the frozen food aisle at 9 o’clock on a Saturday night staring at the home brand frozen French fries, complaining into your mobile to a friend that you refuse to spend more than $3.68 on fries, but that said, a potato gem, well one can’t place a monetary value on genius.

‘Why don’t you just go to McDonald’s or that fish and chip shop around the corner?’ my friend so ignorantly suggested.

‘Because I never actually see them working there. They’re always out the front and that says to me they don’t change their oil.’

‘But you’ll eat something resembling a potato cake no questions asked from Golden Tower at 4am.’

‘My self worth was particularly low that day, and if you remember correctly I also found the guy who ran the 7/11 shaggable that evening. We all have lapses in judgement and anyway I want to make my own chips.’

‘Then buy a potato’

‘No, they have to be frozen, oven baked fries. It’s Saturday night for crying out loud and I have Prime Suspect on DVD. Don’t you see? Scrubbing, peeling, cutting and roasting my own chips – I might as well start wearing knitted trousers and calling my kids Acorn and Wonderment.

There was silence for a moment.

‘Hey, I was thinking, what happens when we don’t have internet?’ My friend pondered.

‘What, like if it didn’t exist?’

‘No, as in, I don’t have it where I’m staying right now.’

‘Well I assume you’ll just have to do what most people do. Call someone, pay them, get it installed, or you could take your laptop outside, find someone to sit in the gutter and cross your fingers.’

‘That’s called stealing.’

‘No, in today’s world it’s referred to as knowledge transfer.’

I awaited her answer while considering if my hair should endure another winter with discount conditioner.

‘Hmmm, look Lou I need to go; my hair dye is bleeding into the handset.’

‘Ha! You’re dying your hair on a Saturday night – loser!’

‘You’re buying frozen chips.’

‘Ok, to be fair I’ve now moved onto condiments.’

‘Yep, how’s that cognitive therapy working out?’

‘I haven’t started yet, like I only just gave up coffee and all other stimulants including men- BAM! – did you get it? It was a joke!’

‘Yeah, Lou I got it, but I think you should hop to it, cause just imagine how embarrassed you’ll be after I visit you after your first suicide attempt. I mean you’ll just kick yourself.’

‘I’m hanging up now.’

‘Enjoy your potato.’

‘Thank you. I will.’

Now at home and settled into with my box set of Prime Suspect a.k.a Helen Mirren marathon and chips, I began to imagine myself as DCI Tennison. I smiled as she spoke of fish fingers, knowing that she too wouldn’t have broken budget to buy the better frozen chips. We both shared that quality of great humility coupled with superiority. I didn’t have time to think of all our other similarities, the DVD was about to start.

NOTE TO SELF: forge new career as actor as have recently discovered an ability to emphasise with Oscar winning actress Helen Mirren. Follow up with manager on Monday.

Often when one thinks of romance we conjure up images of young, nubile (look, maybe that’s just me and my penchant for being able to bounce things off walls) creatures, fornicating on a deserted beach at sunset, declaring a love that need not speak its name, unapologetically crushing the pink tinged roses he’d bought her at the start of their date…

To be honest though, after years of getting sand in my crutch and never been given flowers, when I think of romance it’s slightly more evolved, having changed from whispers of sweet nothings to something more along the lines of that if I’ve been seeing a guy for a few months and I don’t receive a phone call from a friend telling me he’s been shagging someone else, well I burst into tears of happiness cause fuck me I’ve never felt so much joy.

However in recent weeks my idea of romance has evolved once again, it’s more platonic by nature (and no, I’m not mounting objects on the wall and running at them). Whether this has been a result of getting better bed sheets or recent illness’s ‘how many flu’s can you get?’ it’s growing where?’ and ‘you’re not pregnant like we first thought, it’s an infection’, I’ve found myself seduced by the romance of being a shut in.

It started simply enough. Friends asking me to go and have a good time with them, sure it seemed like a nice idea but that would involved getting dressed into what I call my ‘outside’ clothes and I’d only recently discovered the benefits of your ex leaving his crap at yours – large over sized hooded jumpers. I needed to devote as much time as I could to this new found discovery. Of course I wasn’t a complete social drop out; I’d always offer a solution to my friends:

‘Come around to mine and I’ll make us some dinner, we don’t need to go out to have a good time.’

‘Will you be wearing pants?’

‘Yes’

‘And what about that gingham smock thing?’

‘I’ll be wearing both; I’ve neither shaved my underarms or my legs.’

I did understand though why my friends started seeing other people when my dinner menu consisted of the one and only question ‘baked beans or spaghettio’s, and I don’t have any bread, we’ll just have to make do without bread right?’

My flat mates were as supportive as they could be with it all, but when one wandered in to see me reading my copy of Laura Bushes biography and fiddling with the oven whilst drinking my 10th cup of strong Yorkshire tea for the day and lamenting I couldn’t find my anti-anxiety medication anywhere useful and must’ve left it in the shower, well he had to intervene cause ‘Lou, you haven’t showered in days, lets stop making shit up ok?’

I was sure I wasn’t a complete lost cause; after all I had to leave the house to go to my local video store to continue my research on British police procedural dramas. What I was researching I didn’t know quite yet. It had taken me about 30 seconds to admit to myself I’d so go Vincent D’Onofrio from Law & Order Criminal Intent, but the lead guy from Midsummer Murders, well it had been over 6 years and I still wasn’t convinced, as such there was much work to be done.

The video store was easy enough; people go in there with top high ponytails and hooded jumpers all the time. I made my selection, including some DVD’s of a show I was to be in, but when I got to the counter and the clerk informed me I was one over my Weekly Special limit I chose to put that DVD back – really, I thought, I should buy it, you know support local industry the way it was supporting me – the clerk seemed happy with my selection including the one I chose to put back.

‘Good choice putting that one back. If you asked me we stopped making people laugh when the Crocodile Hunter died.’

Arriving home shortly after I logged onto the internet and joined an online DVD rental store.

It was pointed out though at some point, even though I was literally living in my own filth trying to work to deadline that I might need deodorant or a leg razor, you know for ‘special occasions.’

Trudging out in my smock and high tops I walked the 50 meters to my local shopping centre and found myself staring at the deodorant rack, armed with soy milk, veggie burgers, HP sauce and Oreos, debating whether a further spend of 38c was warranted given I wasn’t loyal to any sort of particular brand. To this day I don’t know the difference between a deodorant and an antiperspirant and I’m afraid I’m too old to ask.

Now I’m not casting judgment on anyone that picks up in the toiletries aisle at a supermarket, but I’m not a huge fun of scoring anywhere near where they sell lubricant and indigestion tablets, because it would be too much like looking into a future relationship mirror. So imagine my surprise if you will when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I spun around to see a man wearing elastic wasted trousers – enough said.

‘I know you from somewhere’ he so eloquently observed.

My vanity got the better of me, Christ I was in a smock and trainers.

‘No, I don’t think so.’

‘Yes, I saw you die at Vibe comedy one night. It was awful you were shit.’

‘Thanks.’
‘Me I like jokes that rhyme.’

‘We all have a type.’

‘That we do, that we do.’

‘So buying deodorant, you don’t smell that bad.’

‘I wear deodorant.’

‘Then why you buying more?’

‘It’s not like a never ending packet of Tim Tams.’

‘I don’t understand’.

…and it was at that point I realized he quite possibly wasn’t even 24, of course he wouldn’t get the reference.

‘Look, um, if you’re not doing anything would you like to come to Maccas with me? I have a voucher and a health care car, gets you a discount’

He then noticed my soy milk and before I could answer…

‘..hey sorry, just saw the soy milk, but that’s cool, we both like vag.’

I went home and joined Woolworths Home Delivery and safe in the knowledge I wasn’t leaving my house anytime soon, took off my pants.

I experienced my first walk out the other night at comedy festival. A young couple who seated themselves so far back, I thought for a moment they were trying to position themselves to also catch a glimpse of the other show in the next room, at the very least to experience the touch of faux velvet curtains adorning the makeshift theatre against the whites of their skin.

What amused me about it all was the timing. Having just knocked out a bit about a finger assault of the insertion variety, I could admit ‘ok, not everyone’s cup of tea’, but to walk out in the middle of my ode to seaQuest DSV’s Jonthathan Brandis, well that’s just rude – the man hung himself for crying out loud – I don’t expect laughs, but respect, at the very least I expect that and so does Jonathan.

But that’s the thing about walk out’s, they never live up to the expectation, well mine don’t anyway. I always sit there offended and then at an ill considered time like say if someone’s asking after the health of my mother, I storm out, realise how out of context me walking out would make no sense to the person I was trying to prove a passionate point with and then I have to come back into the room, let them know my mother is in fine health and yes, I know you also tried to sleep with my boyfriend last month, and that’s really inconsiderate given we all know your rash hasn’t quite cleared up yet – and then I leave the room again – the thing about the walk out is you have to commit to it.

Given my audience walk outs didn’t return that night, I take my hat off to them – I often worry about the lack of conviction in today’s youth, but they managed to reassure me somewhat that not all is lost.

There are a few of my own walkouts that still stick in my head.

1. Being dragged to see a NIDA first year graduate piece on movement and walking out. (yes, I know, it clearly doesn’t need anymore explanation)

2. Being dragged to a WAPPA musical theatre graduate showcase and walking out.

3. Finding out my mother was really my father one year at Christmas (ok, not true, but saying I walked out because I inadvertently ate fishing bait thinking it was shrimp and thus was made to sit at the children’s table as a result doesn’t have the same impact).

4. Being taken on a date where a guy superimposed his head over mine in a picture and presented it as ‘our future’.

5. Seeing ‘Scary Movie 3’ and having only myself to blame, walked out.

…and then of course there was my walkout of 2009. I’d been seeing this new guy. He seemed pleasant enough and when I say pleasant I mean he didn’t open up with ‘the divorce was hard for me and the kids’ or ‘my mum is just a great flat mate, you know what they say, if it ain’t broke don’t fix it, or cut the umbilical cord’ and my favourite ‘I’m really looking for the one right now, but that might be one in a million and so if I have to sleep with a million women to find that one then it’s special when I finally find her, my only hope is she’s still working at Victoria’s Secret.’

We were hanging out with his friends (he was yet to meet mine, so that should give you a better understanding of where I saw this going) at a show I’d produced, in a bar full of my peers, sitting next to one of my friends when he decided the mood was right for a bit of a chat, oh to make it even more romantic, I’d just gone to kiss him and he pushed me away, nudging me back into the other people on the couch just enough so that they’re attention was now turned on us in that ‘they’re looking but not looking’ kinda way.

‘Um Lou, you know I like you and everything.’

‘Ok…’

‘But here’s the thing, when I look at you I really can’t see this being a relationship thing.’

‘It isn’t a relationship thing.’

‘But, and correct me if I’m wrong, I’m pretty sure you’re viewing it as a relationship thing.’

‘Let me correct you then….’

‘Ok Lou, no need to get worked up about this.’

‘I’m not worked up, but we’ve only gone out three times and I’ve never bought up a relationship.’

‘But you’re 30.’

‘And?’

‘Well it’s inevitable that eventually you’ll bring up the relationship thing, if not now then 7 months or a year from now if we were still going out.’

‘If we were still going out after a year then I’d argue that would be a relationship.’

‘And there in lies my point Lou – see to assume it’d be even close to a relationship after a year is a massive assumption and I can’t see myself in all honesty with someone who makes assumptions for the both of us.’

‘You’re an idiot.’

‘Alright, no need to get mean about this, but I’m breaking up with you and I think it best you hear it from me.’

‘You can’t break up with me if we weren’t really together yet.’

‘Can’t I Lou, can’t I?…you really need to stop being so hooked up about definitions.’

I took a deep breath and wondered to myself about whether or not I should take the door till home with me that night or come back tomorrow.

‘Hey Lou, look if it’s any consolation I still find you really hot and I’m still very attracted to you, like I could easily take you home tonight cause you make me very…, but the thing is when I’m seen out with you in public I find it awkward and uncomfortable for me – there I said it.’

‘Ok’

‘And now I’m having to meet all your friends.’

‘I’ve not even introduced you to one of them.’

‘But I know who they are.’

‘Seeing them on TV does not mean you know them.’

‘Doesn’t it Lou? Doesn’t it?’

And so it was at this point I got up to walk out.

‘Where are you going?’ he asked.

‘Home.’ I grabbed my purse and suddenly my friend who’d been sitting next to me on the other side of the couch gently touched my arm.

‘Everything ok?’ he asked.

‘Yep, just think I got dumped by someone I wasn’t in a relationship with.’

‘Oh who?’

I pointed.

‘I didn’t even know you two were seeing each other.’

‘My point exactly’ I bemoaned to him, catching my stride as I headed towards the door, but not before my ‘dumper’ pulled me to the side.

‘Listen Lou, there’s no need to make a scene by walking out, lets not make you leaving the last memory you and I have together.’

I thought about it for the moment, maybe I shouldn’t leave, it was a nice party after all, actually it was my party….and it really is at this point that a well timed slap and a solid exit would have served me well, or even throwing him out would have been a compromise, but hey, I’m always the first to admit I’m the architect of my own demise…

‘…it’s just’ he continued ‘there’s a girl here who I really like and she’s a fan of your blog and stuff and if she’s us arguing I think that might just sully my chances with her – what do you say?’

‘I say no.’

‘Christ, you just can’t move on can you Lou, just admit it’s over and the sooner you can get back to a normal life, one devoid of this heart ache our break up has caused you.’

‘What script are you reading from?’ I asked.

‘The script of life Lou, you should try it sometime.’

And it was only at the point did I walk out and I’m pretty sure he landed the other lady, so in hindsight I shouldn’t be so harsh on myself – it was very well timed.

At first glance people often thought Cathy was an ethnic, but the truth was she was just nicotine stained, a result of her mother smoking whilst pregnant with her.

The way her mother had seen it, it wasn’t like a barely formed foetus even had actual lungs and in her defence she had quit after 4 months, acknowledging the legal ambivalence that goes with aborting after 16 weeks; so in her mother’s words “she had done her best”, and hey, at least Cathy hadn’t been her older brother or sister her mother often reminded her.

‘But I don’t have any siblings’ Cathy would remark.

‘Exactly’ her mother reaffirmed.

Cathy was so excited to start her first day of school that she didn’t even let her stunted skeletal growth; a result of foetal alcohol syndrome, dampen her enthusiasm for her first day of school at St Joan of Arc Primary.

However, for reasons only God could account for, Cathy had been 4 days late commencing Prep C after finding herself delayed in bushland just off the Hume Highway with her mother, due to the recent introduction of booze buses onto Victoria’s roads. As such all the best seats, next to all the best kids were taken and Cathy was forced to make do with Andrew Morris; a lad already notorious amongst the establishment for picking his nose and eating it. Cathy laughed to herself, so her mother had been right all along, snot was a food group, something Cathy had learned after her mother had had a rather harsh month at the casino roulette wheel – a game which Cathy had often impressed upon her mother was more one of chance then a learned skill. But her mother was adamant; it was the only way she could see to double the amount of Cathy’s father’s wrongful death payout.

As Cathy’s mother would frequent the various “Happy Hour” haunts around town trying to find Cathy a new father or at the very least an uncle, Cathy would entertain herself by doing more task based activities then most young girls her age, like cleaning the backseat of her babysitter/ her mother’s Honda Civic. Acknowledging that Cathy was now old enough at the age of 6 to take on more responsibility, her mother finally gave her her very own key to the car and showed her how to wind the windows up and down. Cathy felt like a princess that day – it was like being given the keys to her very own castle, minus seat belts, or has as her mother liked to call them ‘optional extra’.

Of course as anyone knows with their own castle/ Honda Civic knows, such wealth does attract undue attention, and so every few weeks DOC’s (The Department of Children’s Services) would happen upon Cathy washing out her arm pits in a bus shelter toilet off the Nepean Hwy while her mother was off ‘dogging’ – something even Cathy knew her mother wasn’t very good at given they didn’t even have a dog ‘oh mum, oh silly mum’ she’s often think to herself.

And so Cathy would be taken away and put in a special home with other various nicotine stained kids and emotionally “back-footed” people and as was always the case, she’d make the most of it. Cathy had only ever stabbed by one of them and so considered it a home away from home. Except of course in this home Cathy had a bed, all to herself – but Cathy could never tell her mother any of this, because her mother didn’t believe in beds, well at least not as far as Cathy was concerned. Like her mother said ‘I’m not going to hand things to you Cathy on a silver platter like I was, life is meant to be tough, but hey sweetie if you can over come the obstacles, like a family predilection for a dependency on hardcore narcotics and sexually ambivalent porn- the you deserve everything great you can get, so in summary you need to earn the right to lie down” a right Cathy knew at just 6 years old she was far from obtaining.

But after a few days like always, Cathy had to leave such luxuries like a bed and heated food and return to her mothers upper-middle class newly renovated Brighton seaside bungalow and sit by the pool, as her mother lay nearby instructing “Florida” the houseboy on the best way to give her a thorough Brazilian wax. She really was a woman ahead of her time. Cathy laughed “oh mum, silly, silly mum.’

Dropping into visit a friend last week the last thing I was expecting was an intervention.

‘Well, an intervention of sorts’ my friend muttered, trying to avoid my look of disdain I was firmly aiming at her ‘a boyfriend intervention.’

‘I’m ok, I don’t need any help’

‘You say that Lou, but we both think Todd would be great for you.’

And by Todd, my friend and her boyfriend of barely 4 months meant, Todd – a guy who’s current interests were ‘mortgages and getting a girlfriend’…well just strap me down, shove a Still Nox in me and let him get started, I’ll struggle and scream at the time but apologise in the morning for my belligerence.

‘Don’t be like that Lou; we both think you’re being stubborn and what for? The sake of your own happiness?’

‘Yes, for the sake of this conversation I’m willing to sacrifice my happiness and not meet with Todd, I have no problem meeting people.’

‘But you never keep them do you?’

‘I’m a minimalist’

‘Don’t be cute Lou’

‘Can’t help it.’

‘Speaking of which, you’ve got 5 years of that cute stuff left, tops.’

‘5 years more than you’ I spat back

‘Well at least I have a uterus.’

‘What does that even mean? I have a uterus’

‘Do you Lou? Do you?’

‘Yes’

‘If you don’t use it, you know it disappears, shrivels up and dies and then you get cancer because something needs to grow there.’

‘You can’t practice using a uterus.’

‘Can’t you Lou? Can’t you?’

‘No, unless you’ve taken up late term abortions as a hobby.’

‘I can’t believe you just said that. We’re Catholic Lou – you’re general lack of tolerance for others just upset’s me Lou, it upsets me,’

‘I’m sorry’ I mumbled back as I realised I wouldn’t be sticking around long enough to enjoy a slice of the chocolate cake that had sat cooling on the kitchen bench during our conversation.

‘It’s ok Lou.’

‘I best be off then. Nice to see the two of you again. The tomatoes out the front look great.’

‘So should I tell Todd to give you a call sometime? You know before you launch into trying to have a career in comedy again? You know before you get too serious with it all?’

‘Yeah, that’d be great and I have the perfect date idea.’

‘Oh do tell’

‘I’m going to take him down to the train tracks and we can take it in goes pushing each other in front of oncoming express trains.’

‘You know what Lou, don’t bother calling until you grow up.’

‘That’s fine, wasn’t planning on calling anyway, I’ve run out of credit.’

I left my friend’s house feeling less than triumphant, maybe in part because she was slightly right, quite clearly not about the uterus thing but more with the ‘keeping’ thing. When it came to the ‘keeping’ thing, to say I was socially damaged/ inept/ prone to disaster would be putting it kindly, like a friend telling me that I can wear high necked shirts when even I know I can’t pull that look off.

An example of social retardation when it comes to intimacy and dealing with the men in my life was all too recent. I’d met a guy when I went away, we got on, we hung out, and it was nice. When it was time to call it a day rather than say something cool like ‘you must let me buy you a drink sometime’ (Ok, that felt creepy even as I typed it) or something honest like ‘it’d be nice to hang out and get to know you more’ (which once I graduate from high school will be of no use to me anymore) I merely gave him an awkward hug, slapped him on the arm and said ‘so have a good year.’ Yep, I know what you’re thinking, could you get any hotter Lou? Could you be any more alluring? No, I don’t think I could be even if I tried…

And then I went to a party and ran into someone more socially inept then me when it comes to the opposite sex, but more along the lines of he might be charged for a sex crime in the future and I had no interest in ‘keeping’ him. We were already friends, but I had been warned off being around him when he had been drinking from mutual friends, apparently he had some fantasy involving Latino housemaids and well you know me after one Vodka Cruiser…may I clean your banister sir?

‘Hi Lou you should keep that tan Lou, it suits you, how’d you get it?

‘It’s natural, I have olive skin.’

‘I’ve never touched olive skin before.’

‘It’s the same as any other skin.’

‘Can I touch your skin?’

‘No.’

‘If I bought you a drink maybe you’d let me touch it then?’

‘Can we please stop talking about touching skin.’

‘You’re a feisty girl aren’t you Lou…I like feisty girls.’

‘I’m sure there’s a website that’ll help you out there.’

‘Ha, you’re funny, tell me what are your thoughts on casual sex?’

‘That is can never be casual and that it’s not something I’m going to discuss with you.’

‘ooh, way to shoot a man down Lou.’

‘I’m not shooting you down, there’s nothing too shoot, I just don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘Well maybe I can come home with you and talk it over, I think it could be fun getting to know each other..?’

‘No.’

‘It’s just my flatmate is a really loud snorer.’

‘You’ll cope.’

‘Be honest with me Lou, am I barking up the wrong tree? Was it the olive skin comment did that put you off? Do you think I’m a racist?.’

‘No, it’s fine..I’m going home.’

‘Wanna split a cab’

‘No’

‘You’re going to blog about this aren’t you?’

‘Yes, probably.’

It’s a new year, a new blog, well ok, maybe I’m just using a different font on the blog but it’s hot, so off you go have a shower and cool down…I’ll wait, but not forever, only fleetingly…you have to admit it’s more romantic that way.

Now before I sat down and decided on that font change (and trust me that was as a hard a decision as whether or not to throw out my Leona Edmiston tights because they kept falling down and I couldn’t justify wearing my undies on the outside of them anymore just to hold them up), I was at a summer music festival kicking back with the kids (well people predominantly born in the 80s) and as much as I’d like to admit I went with my surfer buddies armed with our date rape drug of choice and St Tropez tan accelerator I was actually there for work – drunk, ambiguously consensual he-said, she-said group sex would have to be on hold for the festive season.(… and that’s why children I don’t believe in Santa Claus).

After very limited and ill considered conversation by my director along the lines of:

‘You’re doing it Lou’

‘But I have artisitic credibility’

‘You just stuck a twig up your nose for a joke Lou’

‘Well played, well played…’

…it was decided that it would be cute to film me trying to stalk Karen O of the Yeah, Yeah, Yeah’s – a band I was dying to see, but preferrably not while being led away with handcuffs.

It’s not that I didn’t kinda like the idea of following Karen O around for a few days, trying to get her to notice me where maybe she’d catch my eye as we both ordered another plate of Gado Gado in the dining tent and both laughed that there was such a thing as too much satay, it was more the fact I’m completely rubbish at stalking, it feeds into a deep seeded insecurity from high school. I knew my best friend was friending someone else on the side. When I confronted her of course she denied it, so I decided to follow her – the problem is it’s rather hard to stalk someone at the local swimming pool incognito when you have only just learnt to swim again after having tubes in your ears for 4 years and as such are surrounded by flotation devices and still manage to nearly drown in the wading pool and the cute life guard has to rescue you, arse in the air as your best friend yells from the other side of the pool

 ’Are you stalking me Lou?’

‘…yes, yes I am and I think some kid just urinated in here, and I’m pretty sure I got some in my mouth…’

‘I don’t think we should be friends anymore’

‘Yeah, thought you’d say that, fair call.’

So aware of my shortcoming’s as a stalker I asked around:

‘I tried stalking once, but ended up being charged and it just left a bad taste in my mouth after that’ bemoaned a random stranger stabbing his dinner next to me one night.

‘Yeah, I can see how that might dampen the whole experience’

‘I didn’t think she’d take it so seriously, it’s not like the window wasn’t already open. You want anything from the bar?’

‘Um, no thanks, trying not to drink around repeat offenders, bit of a New Year’s resolution.’ I joked as I edged my self closer to the cute boy seated to the other side of me, but it would appear that the only difference between him and the guy one might describe to a judge as a ‘perpretrator’ was he just had never been caught.

‘It’s all about electronic stalking and getting the right software to erase your IP address. You gotta be smart about these things, otherwise it goes from being romantic to downright scary.’

His other advice involved:

1. Breaking the lock of their door by filling it with blu tak so as to make it easier to open when they weren’t at home and then smelling something of theirs.

2. Climbing a tree outside their home, but make sure they don’t see you. You want them  to feel someone’s presence, enough to make the hair on the back of their neck stand on, but not enough for them to call the police.

3. Hiring someone to do it because you can’t be everywhere at once and  the thing about stalking is consistancy, you need to be consistant.

Great,  so cute guy was not only romantic but also a little bit scary…well I could break that new years resolution later. A  girlfriend of mine justified his explanations by citing that his parents met via stalking – ah, well if it’s a family tradition…and as for my friend there was no use in asking her for advice because here was a woman that stalked her current beau to the point she sent him anonymous messages, flyered their neighbourhood with declarations of her love for him and made a film about the whole thing – me Googling Karen O paled in comparisons to the lengths those around me had gone to to get someone to notice them.

What didn’t help was that she wasn’t due to arrive until about an hour before her set, so I spent the days leading up asking around after her, getting free juice off the boys that ran the juice stand, molesting the VIP bus driver for information and being forced on a ferris wheel(with the lady who ran it telling me to grow a pair as I trepidatiously stepped on board) regardless of my fear of heights to see whether or not her helicopter had arrived yet, being caught pretending to break into her house and using the word strap-on straight to camera more than was probably necessary at the time and building a shrine of Ms O near our camping spot – in short it was 56 hours of humiliating myself for a joke that at this stage was more set-up then punchline.

And then finally she arrived and with her arrival came the declaration that no one was allowed near her. I was relieved, I’d never actually planned on meeting Ms O, in fact the joke rested on my inability to meet her and so now I could just sit back and enjoy her concert, well just before I was told I was going to have to climb a fence into the mosh pit armed with a sign that read ‘Karen O be my best friend and maybe something more’…yep, I wasn’t quite done with my destroying my career quite yet.

My friend handed me her scotch filled hip flask and with dutch courage I headed out into the 16, 000 strong crowd, well me behind a barrier with water pistol armed security and some delightful boys behind me miming me giving them blow jobs straight to camera – such is the burden of fame I’ve been told. If that wasn’t enough, a segment I’d shot then went to air…

‘Is that you?’ a regular looking cockspanker next me asked.

‘Yep’ I nodded.

And with that confirmed he tossed a bottle at my face.

‘You gonna cry now?’ he scathingly asked.

‘No’ I told him, but of course Isaid that without taking into consideration that only moments later  a renegade beach ball would hit me in the eye and it was then I burst into tears – I like to choose my moments – a bottle in the eye doesn’t make me cry, but soft beach toys…

Running away to the toilets I found my hip flask friend and got drunk on the steps of the VIP toilets, at one point drawing the attention of a local Melbourne muscian who told me that some woman had licked him that day when she realised who he was…’so you see Lou there are cockspankers everywhere.’ He was right, I needed to get my dignity back and the only way to do that was to go and watch Ms O on stage, strutting her confident gold…the only problem was I’d gotten so drunk I’d missed the concert – I was losing my patience with 2009 fast.

Feeling a little ill I headed off into the bathroom only to turn around and realise I was face-to-face with a sweat covered woman – Karen O.

‘Hi’ she beamed at me as she adjusted her hair in the mirror.

‘You ok?’

‘Yep, I’m fine’ I mumbled back (please don’t light a match around me Ms O, I’ll kill us both)

‘Did you enjoy the concert?’

‘Um, I didn’t see it…I’ve been trying to stalk you.’

‘Oh’

…awkward……………………….silence……awkward silence…………………………………………………….

‘Do you want a photo?’

This was my opporunity to get my dignity back, to finally get the front foot…and so I said the only thing I could say.

‘No, that’s cool.’

‘You sure?’ asked a perplexed Ms O

‘Yeah, totally, I have heaps of posters of you…I even have a shrine of you up here with me so I’m sorted.’

‘Ok’ and with that Ms O, or Kazza as I like to now call her walked away from me and to be honest I would’ve walked away from me too and sure I might’ve misplaced my dignity that day and ruined any chance ever of being Facebook friends with Ms O but I got something better than that – I’d successfully (albeit incidentally) stalked Karen O and so I smiled to my make-up smeared, scotch soaked self with toilet paper stuck in my shoe reflection and hi-fived it.

Surely I was the winner here? and now to make the bold decision…whether or not to throw out those tights as I could feel my undies rolling down again…

Yes, so it’s day 1 of Falls Festival 2010. So far I’ve been told where the toilets will be set up eventually up and in the mean time to use a well positioned tree, I’m short enough and I’ve also completely alienated myself for the remainder of the festival from the campers to the right of me – a group of fit looking, young 20 something girls, the sort you could bounce off walls and I say that with a degree of jealously and 30 something loathing and envy – I call it ‘lonvy’. (Please note, it is yet to catch on, and before you email me pointing that out, quite clearly I’ve just acknowledged it, so best you go back to emailing Scarlett Johanssen about that dream you’ve been having of late about her, you know the one where you wake up wet and covered in shame…). I’ve managed to not make firm and fast friends here, but not for lack of trying.

Ok, so I was brushing my teeth in the dark, as you do, when I stumbled onto the girls next door trying to erect their tent, and to their credit they were trying to do it without tops on – yes, that porno my ex once dreamed up and pitched to me was about to come true. They scurried to cover themselves up as soon as they sensed my presence, but who was I to rest on ceremony?

‘Don’t cover up on my account’ I remarked, suddenly painfully aware of lack of bra beneath layers of tracksuit jumpers and gravity. ‘It’s nothing I haven’t seen before’ and yes, I said it with all the creepy the weight of a peodophile languishing casually outside a school playground. The girls moved faster to cover themselves up and as such I just kept going with it..’I've got my own pair you see, but they’re just a lot bigger than any of yours.’ Yep, what followed was a well deserved silence. ‘Um, no I didn’t mean it like that, I meant that if I could I would get around erecting tents with my top off too, not that I haven’t erected a tent in my time and I’m sure my pair have something to do with it if you get my drift (note, a blind Japanese whaler would have gotten my drift), if anything I’m just really jealous, cause by the looks of things you don’t need much support do you?…like you’d do a nice strappy sundress the justice it deserved right?’ Again silence, followed by me removing myself from the situation and now I’m sitting in my tent by the light of my torch waiting for them to go to bed before I position myself outside their tent for the evening and just watch them sleep.