Bridezilla
The Mandarin Club
November 28, 2007
They're not quite there yet, but the kiddies in Bridezilla are on their way...
More such talk at Mess + Noise yonder.
Friday, 30 November 2007
Tuesday, 27 November 2007
Going feral
A few weeks ago I was roped in by the lovely Angela Stengel as photo monkey for an article she was writing for Cyclic Defrost on Danny Jumpertz and Feral Media.
I was warned that I would be rendered fairly jealous by the Camperdown warehouse that is Feral Media HQ, doubling as a home for Danny and Feral Media co-runner Caroline.
The prediction came true. But putting the green-eyed monster to one side, I managed a few snaps, which can now be found over with Angela's delightful tale.
Monday, 26 November 2007
Farewell
He's gone.
After more than a decade of deceit and divisiveness, Australia can finally emerge from the long dark shadow cast by outgoing Prime Minister John Howard.
Acknowledged even within his own conservative party as a mean and tricky piece of work, Howard missed the perfect opportunity to retire at the top, steering the Coalition not only to utter humiliation across the nation in Saturday's election, but looking like being only the second prime minister in Australian history to also lose his seat.
A master politician, Howard held onto power as long as he did by preying on ignorance and fear and tapping into the worst aspects of Australian culture and parochialism, through dog whistling xenophobia, pork-barelling and cleverly milking any 'anti-' sentiment onto which he could latch.
This, at a time where the resources boom flooded government coffers with cash that they could use to selectively bribe key constituents in their desperate (and largely successful) bids to stay in power.
As with any election in living memory, it was not won by the opposition but lost by the government. The Coalition's extreme workplace laws and the disgraceful stripping of workers' rights - introduced without even the hint of a mandate - appear to have been Howard's undoing, along with his broken promises on interest rates. An ugly, sloppy campaign based on scaremongering and union-bashing failed to win back lagging support.
Pulling rabbit after rabbit out of the hat in previous elections, there was always the fear that Howard could do it again, but thankfully there was nothing left in the bag of tricks this time around.
The starkest reminder of what we have lived through for almost 12 years of his rule comes in the responses given when Howard or his fellow party members are pressed to point to highlights of his time in power. Again and again they raise his response to the Port Arthur massacre (a welcome tightening of gun controls) and the Bali bombings.
Not a single example is put forward of a visionary policy, a uniting moment, a symbolic or practical gesture that suggests he will leave Australia a better place to live for the trust he has been given.
It would be nice to imagine the landslide return of the Labor government from the wilderness was a vote for a return to decency, respect and caring for others - particularly those most in need. That it was to send a message that we will not tolerate a war-mongering, narrow-minded, lying leader who could share no vision for the future beyond preserving his own legacy.
It's far more likely to reflect the government getting a kicking for rising interest rates and costs of living, with the opposition finally putting forward a candidate that the Government wasn't able to undermine.
But for now there's at least a small window of hope. We have a new government that is not helmed by a climate change skeptic and ideologue on a crusade against 'political correctness', that has promised investment in health, education and tackling climate change, as well as a staged withdrawal of troops from Iraq. A party that will work closely with the US, but hopefully not hand over foreign policy for a chance to be considered George Bush's deputy sherriff.
Issues such as the life expectancy and living conditions of Indigenous Australians are still, as ever, likely to take a back seat - and new leader Kevin Rudd has given little hope to those looking for a more humane refugee policy - but at least we can finally look forward to taking one step at a time towards a brighter future and not feel like we're caught in an inexorable slide into a social, cultural and environmental abyss.
To steal Mungo MacCallum's recollection of Gough Whitlam's quotation of the last line of Dante’s Inferno:
E quindi uscimmo a reverder le stelle
And thence we emerged, to see the stars again.
After more than a decade of deceit and divisiveness, Australia can finally emerge from the long dark shadow cast by outgoing Prime Minister John Howard.
Acknowledged even within his own conservative party as a mean and tricky piece of work, Howard missed the perfect opportunity to retire at the top, steering the Coalition not only to utter humiliation across the nation in Saturday's election, but looking like being only the second prime minister in Australian history to also lose his seat.
A master politician, Howard held onto power as long as he did by preying on ignorance and fear and tapping into the worst aspects of Australian culture and parochialism, through dog whistling xenophobia, pork-barelling and cleverly milking any 'anti-' sentiment onto which he could latch.
This, at a time where the resources boom flooded government coffers with cash that they could use to selectively bribe key constituents in their desperate (and largely successful) bids to stay in power.
As with any election in living memory, it was not won by the opposition but lost by the government. The Coalition's extreme workplace laws and the disgraceful stripping of workers' rights - introduced without even the hint of a mandate - appear to have been Howard's undoing, along with his broken promises on interest rates. An ugly, sloppy campaign based on scaremongering and union-bashing failed to win back lagging support.
Pulling rabbit after rabbit out of the hat in previous elections, there was always the fear that Howard could do it again, but thankfully there was nothing left in the bag of tricks this time around.
The starkest reminder of what we have lived through for almost 12 years of his rule comes in the responses given when Howard or his fellow party members are pressed to point to highlights of his time in power. Again and again they raise his response to the Port Arthur massacre (a welcome tightening of gun controls) and the Bali bombings.
Not a single example is put forward of a visionary policy, a uniting moment, a symbolic or practical gesture that suggests he will leave Australia a better place to live for the trust he has been given.
It would be nice to imagine the landslide return of the Labor government from the wilderness was a vote for a return to decency, respect and caring for others - particularly those most in need. That it was to send a message that we will not tolerate a war-mongering, narrow-minded, lying leader who could share no vision for the future beyond preserving his own legacy.
It's far more likely to reflect the government getting a kicking for rising interest rates and costs of living, with the opposition finally putting forward a candidate that the Government wasn't able to undermine.
But for now there's at least a small window of hope. We have a new government that is not helmed by a climate change skeptic and ideologue on a crusade against 'political correctness', that has promised investment in health, education and tackling climate change, as well as a staged withdrawal of troops from Iraq. A party that will work closely with the US, but hopefully not hand over foreign policy for a chance to be considered George Bush's deputy sherriff.
Issues such as the life expectancy and living conditions of Indigenous Australians are still, as ever, likely to take a back seat - and new leader Kevin Rudd has given little hope to those looking for a more humane refugee policy - but at least we can finally look forward to taking one step at a time towards a brighter future and not feel like we're caught in an inexorable slide into a social, cultural and environmental abyss.
To steal Mungo MacCallum's recollection of Gough Whitlam's quotation of the last line of Dante’s Inferno:
E quindi uscimmo a reverder le stelle
And thence we emerged, to see the stars again.
Thursday, 22 November 2007
The Music Box: Chapter Fifty-Four
Isabelle felt her soft footfall lightly crunch on fallen twigs and drying pine needles, smelling the cool air of the approaching evening. She would need to be back to the shelter she had made herself fairly soon, the electric smell of an approaching storm was tickling her nose. To her left and right the forest appeared an impenetrable tangle, growing in a calculated disorder intended to discourage wayward wandering. The path along which she travelled would not have appeared to almost anybody else to be that, but Isabelle had been here long enough to recognise the telltale, if slight, signs that others had been this way. Small animals mostly, but occasionally a larger creature; man-sized but not walking on two legs as she was now.
She understood that she was looking for something, but wasn’t sure what that might be. She wasn’t retracing her steps, of that she seemed certain, yet the feeling that she would know what it was when she found it was strong.
Isabelle felt an unnerving sense of being watched. She carefully looked around as she went, trying to appear nonchalant, but nothing caught her eye that betrayed the presence of anyone but herself. She was unable to shake the feeling, but was determined not to let the rising fear take hold. She had lived here before, she reminded herself, was familiar with its risks and dramas, and had met and faced them all.
Reaching a huge grey tree, its gnarled branches twisting to the sky like witch’s fingers, thick, coarse bark cracked like a the mud in a dry creek bed, Isabelle stopped. There appeared to be a fork in the path, the choice of which way to follow weighing surprisingly heavily on her, as though a momentous moment was resting on such a seemingly simple decision.
Once she chose one there was no going back. That much she knew. Unsure of what it was for which she was searching – but increasingly certain that it would be found, for better or for worse – Isabelle took a deep breath and looked up at the tree for any sign it might be trying to send. After a long moment, its uppermost branches began to stir, although there was very little breeze in the cooling air. The stirring grew into a twisting, tangling dance, the uppermost branches waving and turning with enchanting grace.
The few tenacious leaves that hung on to the occasional branch held on for dear life, although one that must have been surprised by the sudden activity, caught napping, fell from its previously stable perch. It began a slow flutter towards the forest floor, tracing a diminishing parabola as it fell. Instinctively, Isabelle put out her hand as it neared. The leaf settled neatly into her small cupped hand, a brittle aged leaf alighting like the ghost trace of an ancient butterfly.
Closing her fingers gently over the top of the leaf, Isabelle felt it tickle her palm. She opened her hand again and jumped as the leaf unfurled – it really was a butterfly! But not like any she had ever seen before – a grey-green colour when it had first landed on her palm, it was now a deep blue, the inky near-purple of twilight after a particularly warm summer’s day. It hovered in front of her, darting in small, dashing sweeps in a vaguely circular arc, then took off past the tree, darting to its left. Isabelle hesitated, but seeing the butterfly loop back towards her and head back down the path again – now a crimson flash in the shadowy late afternoon, she followed.
Isabelle had made up her mind to head the other way, but felt compelled to follow, taking it as a sign – of what, she had no idea, but it was too late to go back now.
She followed into a part of the forest she could not recall ever having seen. She had made it her own during her stay, explored what she had thought at the time was every twist and turn, every nook and cranny, so was surprised to be so disoriented.
It was growing cooler as she went on – the sun had dipped over the horizon some time ago and the brush here was quite thick and damp. Every now and then she lost sight of her guide, but just as soon as she was certain it had gone too far to keep up with, she caught another glimpse. Now that it was quite dark it seemed to have a glow of its own, a gently pulsating yellow light flickering with each beating of the wings.
She followed it until it reached a bend in the path that opened out onto a river. Wide and swift-flowing, there was a silvery-sheen on the surface of the water where the break in the forest canopy allowed the full moon to shine. Isabelle watched as the butterfly travelled halfway across the river, soared vertically, then exploded into a million tiny stars that scattered over the water in a blaze of light and colour, then vanished.
Without a second thought Isabelle drew a deep breath and plunged into the river.
She understood that she was looking for something, but wasn’t sure what that might be. She wasn’t retracing her steps, of that she seemed certain, yet the feeling that she would know what it was when she found it was strong.
Isabelle felt an unnerving sense of being watched. She carefully looked around as she went, trying to appear nonchalant, but nothing caught her eye that betrayed the presence of anyone but herself. She was unable to shake the feeling, but was determined not to let the rising fear take hold. She had lived here before, she reminded herself, was familiar with its risks and dramas, and had met and faced them all.
Reaching a huge grey tree, its gnarled branches twisting to the sky like witch’s fingers, thick, coarse bark cracked like a the mud in a dry creek bed, Isabelle stopped. There appeared to be a fork in the path, the choice of which way to follow weighing surprisingly heavily on her, as though a momentous moment was resting on such a seemingly simple decision.
Once she chose one there was no going back. That much she knew. Unsure of what it was for which she was searching – but increasingly certain that it would be found, for better or for worse – Isabelle took a deep breath and looked up at the tree for any sign it might be trying to send. After a long moment, its uppermost branches began to stir, although there was very little breeze in the cooling air. The stirring grew into a twisting, tangling dance, the uppermost branches waving and turning with enchanting grace.
The few tenacious leaves that hung on to the occasional branch held on for dear life, although one that must have been surprised by the sudden activity, caught napping, fell from its previously stable perch. It began a slow flutter towards the forest floor, tracing a diminishing parabola as it fell. Instinctively, Isabelle put out her hand as it neared. The leaf settled neatly into her small cupped hand, a brittle aged leaf alighting like the ghost trace of an ancient butterfly.
Closing her fingers gently over the top of the leaf, Isabelle felt it tickle her palm. She opened her hand again and jumped as the leaf unfurled – it really was a butterfly! But not like any she had ever seen before – a grey-green colour when it had first landed on her palm, it was now a deep blue, the inky near-purple of twilight after a particularly warm summer’s day. It hovered in front of her, darting in small, dashing sweeps in a vaguely circular arc, then took off past the tree, darting to its left. Isabelle hesitated, but seeing the butterfly loop back towards her and head back down the path again – now a crimson flash in the shadowy late afternoon, she followed.
Isabelle had made up her mind to head the other way, but felt compelled to follow, taking it as a sign – of what, she had no idea, but it was too late to go back now.
She followed into a part of the forest she could not recall ever having seen. She had made it her own during her stay, explored what she had thought at the time was every twist and turn, every nook and cranny, so was surprised to be so disoriented.
It was growing cooler as she went on – the sun had dipped over the horizon some time ago and the brush here was quite thick and damp. Every now and then she lost sight of her guide, but just as soon as she was certain it had gone too far to keep up with, she caught another glimpse. Now that it was quite dark it seemed to have a glow of its own, a gently pulsating yellow light flickering with each beating of the wings.
She followed it until it reached a bend in the path that opened out onto a river. Wide and swift-flowing, there was a silvery-sheen on the surface of the water where the break in the forest canopy allowed the full moon to shine. Isabelle watched as the butterfly travelled halfway across the river, soared vertically, then exploded into a million tiny stars that scattered over the water in a blaze of light and colour, then vanished.
Without a second thought Isabelle drew a deep breath and plunged into the river.
Monday, 19 November 2007
Vinyl Diaries XIII: Machine Translations
Machine Translations + The Bank Holidays
The Gaelic Club
November 16, 2007
A handful of words over at Mess + Noise
The Gaelic Club
November 16, 2007
A handful of words over at Mess + Noise
Friday, 16 November 2007
The Music Box: Chapter Fifty-Three
Something strange was happening. When Emily opened the book to read, she was met with a jumble of letters and images and sketches that bore no relation to anything about which she could make sense.
What could have possibly happened? She turned to the first page, the passages she had only just read, but was met by the same jagged junkheap, letters used and abandoned, crashing into the corner and jutting nonsensically.
“It knows,” she murmured. “It’s realised I’m not Crouch.”
Emily closed the book again and stared intently at the cover. She placed a hand on its leather front and boomed.
“It is I, Aloysius Crouch. Do you dare to defy me? Reveal yourself, be true to what you are!”
Emily was shocked to hear the cold, fearful voice, not sure where as to where the command had even originated. She had not consciously considered what she would do, yet here she was, bellowing at the book in Crouch’s chilling tone.
While she considered what might have happened, the book started to shake, suddenly so warm she almost dropped it off the edge of the pier, into the lapping waves below. Luckily it caught on one of Crouch’s bony knees and she was able just to keep hold. Tentatively, she reopened the book and saw –with a mix of relief and sickly fear – that the jumble had now rearranged itself back into Crouch’s carefully laid out hand; it was back to how it had been when first she picked it up.
With the same mix of fear and relief, driven by curiosity and urgency, Emily turned to the end of the first section and began to read from where she had left off.
As much as Man fears the wolves, Wolf cannot stand to be around Man. They recognise him for what he is – a weak, pale imitation of what he could be. They have no respect for this, and rightly so!
So how, then, can Man get close enough to Wolf to relearn what he must know?
Until now, there has not been a way. But I, Aloysius Crouch, have discovered a way to become what I need. My many experiments have led to a breakthrough. I have unearthed a process through which I can take the form of any subject of my choosing. At first I was unhappy with the process, unwilling to give my body over to those whose body I was to command. But I have devised a way that this need never occur.
I can keep them, their so-called ‘selves’, in a box as I take control of their form. I need only their body - the rest of them just gets in the way, dilutes my being and makes it difficult to achieve full command.
By sending them into this box, I free the only obstacle that ever stood between me and taking them over entirely. While this has now worked on a number of occasions with various, expendable urchins from around the village, I now need to find an appropriate form by which to get closer to the wolves who can teach me so much.
Which brings me to my greatest challenge of all – finding just such a wolf that I can become.
Emily had to stop again, feeling her tummy turn backflips as though she were going to be sick. This sick, twisted, cruel monster had so casually talked of using and discarding children in the village – she herself had witnessed just how readily he could sacrifice them.
This time, however, he wasn’t going to get away with it. The determination to put an end to Crouch’s evil-doing boiled Emily’s blood. She could almost feel the steam coming from her ears as she experienced anger and bitterness at those lost lives, all in aid of his sick depravities, this idea that we should live our lives as though beasts.
Emily didn’t have anything against wolves. Her experience in the music box showed her they were far from the kinds of creatures with which she would ever wish to associate, but she also knew that they simply were what they were, you couldn’t hold them any more responsible for that than you could blame the wind for blowing, the moon for rising.
She remembered a day when she could have only been three or four, on a forest walk with her mother and father. As her parents were choosing a spot for their lunch, she saw across the clearing what she had first thought was a funny looking dog. Black, long, large, it had met her eye as she watched it. Silently they stared at each other, her parents busy setting up a blanket and setting down their basket. She looked to see whether her parents had seen it but by the time she turned back to where it had been it was gone.
Emily hadn’t thought to say anything to her parents about what she had seen. She didn’t feel any fear – hadn’t known that she was supposed to – but merely believed it was just one of the forest’s many creatures and no different to have come across than a bunny or a deer.
But now she shivered at the thought of it, wondered if it really had been a wolf after all.
What could have possibly happened? She turned to the first page, the passages she had only just read, but was met by the same jagged junkheap, letters used and abandoned, crashing into the corner and jutting nonsensically.
“It knows,” she murmured. “It’s realised I’m not Crouch.”
Emily closed the book again and stared intently at the cover. She placed a hand on its leather front and boomed.
“It is I, Aloysius Crouch. Do you dare to defy me? Reveal yourself, be true to what you are!”
Emily was shocked to hear the cold, fearful voice, not sure where as to where the command had even originated. She had not consciously considered what she would do, yet here she was, bellowing at the book in Crouch’s chilling tone.
While she considered what might have happened, the book started to shake, suddenly so warm she almost dropped it off the edge of the pier, into the lapping waves below. Luckily it caught on one of Crouch’s bony knees and she was able just to keep hold. Tentatively, she reopened the book and saw –with a mix of relief and sickly fear – that the jumble had now rearranged itself back into Crouch’s carefully laid out hand; it was back to how it had been when first she picked it up.
With the same mix of fear and relief, driven by curiosity and urgency, Emily turned to the end of the first section and began to read from where she had left off.
As much as Man fears the wolves, Wolf cannot stand to be around Man. They recognise him for what he is – a weak, pale imitation of what he could be. They have no respect for this, and rightly so!
So how, then, can Man get close enough to Wolf to relearn what he must know?
Until now, there has not been a way. But I, Aloysius Crouch, have discovered a way to become what I need. My many experiments have led to a breakthrough. I have unearthed a process through which I can take the form of any subject of my choosing. At first I was unhappy with the process, unwilling to give my body over to those whose body I was to command. But I have devised a way that this need never occur.
I can keep them, their so-called ‘selves’, in a box as I take control of their form. I need only their body - the rest of them just gets in the way, dilutes my being and makes it difficult to achieve full command.
By sending them into this box, I free the only obstacle that ever stood between me and taking them over entirely. While this has now worked on a number of occasions with various, expendable urchins from around the village, I now need to find an appropriate form by which to get closer to the wolves who can teach me so much.
Which brings me to my greatest challenge of all – finding just such a wolf that I can become.
Emily had to stop again, feeling her tummy turn backflips as though she were going to be sick. This sick, twisted, cruel monster had so casually talked of using and discarding children in the village – she herself had witnessed just how readily he could sacrifice them.
This time, however, he wasn’t going to get away with it. The determination to put an end to Crouch’s evil-doing boiled Emily’s blood. She could almost feel the steam coming from her ears as she experienced anger and bitterness at those lost lives, all in aid of his sick depravities, this idea that we should live our lives as though beasts.
Emily didn’t have anything against wolves. Her experience in the music box showed her they were far from the kinds of creatures with which she would ever wish to associate, but she also knew that they simply were what they were, you couldn’t hold them any more responsible for that than you could blame the wind for blowing, the moon for rising.
She remembered a day when she could have only been three or four, on a forest walk with her mother and father. As her parents were choosing a spot for their lunch, she saw across the clearing what she had first thought was a funny looking dog. Black, long, large, it had met her eye as she watched it. Silently they stared at each other, her parents busy setting up a blanket and setting down their basket. She looked to see whether her parents had seen it but by the time she turned back to where it had been it was gone.
Emily hadn’t thought to say anything to her parents about what she had seen. She didn’t feel any fear – hadn’t known that she was supposed to – but merely believed it was just one of the forest’s many creatures and no different to have come across than a bunny or a deer.
But now she shivered at the thought of it, wondered if it really had been a wolf after all.
Tuesday, 13 November 2007
The Music Box: Chapter Fifty-Two
Isabelle dropped the brush she had just picked up, hearing only a faint distant sound as it clattered to the floor.
She had never told Emily about her time in the woods, or in fact anything from the time before Seaforth. Often Emily had asked about why the other children had grandparents and she didn’t, and where Percy and Isabelle had come from if they had not grown up in Seaforth, but they had always assured her that they would tell her everything when the time was right.
Her voice, trembling, caught in her throat, but she managed to get it out. “What did you just say?”
Emily gazed up at her with her piercing eyes and Isabelle suddenly felt like she had to close her mind off, that Emily was somehow reaching in there and seeing things without her saying a word.
“I asked about your time in the woods. I would like to hear about them.”
Before Isabelle could say anything, Percy came through the doorway. He had his hat in his hand and was just pulling on his coat, so Isabelle knew he was off to town.
“Percy love, why don’t you take Emily down with you? You know she loves a visit into town.”
“Hmmmm?” asked Percy absentmindedly, patting his coat pocket as though assuring himself that whatever it was he had in there had not mysteriously disappeared as he walked into the room.
“Oh yes, why not? Come along Emily, we’ll not be out too long and then you have the rest of the day.”
Isabelle watched Emily and saw she frowned her brow, before quickly forcing on a false smile. She knew Emily normally jumped at the chance to get down to the main street, so was perplexed at the cloud that passed over her. But if she had blinked she would have missed it, for Emily was now nodding at the idea, though a furtive glance thrown over her shoulder told Isabelle that her daughter seemed quite displeased at the prospect of being out with Percy.
“Go get something warm on Emily, so you don’t catch a chill.”
Emily slipped from her seat, and without further a word slipped out through the doorway.
“Percy?” Isabelle began. “Have you noticed anything at all… strange about Emily?”
“What? Oh no, not really. I mean she seems a little quiet at the moment, but then I daresay that’s not all that unusual, she definitely goes through these patches.”
What neither of them would say, but each must have known the other was thinking, was that Percy wouldn’t really have been able to tell if Emily had grown a second head and was speaking fluent Chinese. Percy knew as well as Isabelle that he could be a little vague and distracted while in one of his writing periods, but Isabelle was so proud of him that she did not dare burst his bubble with too much worry, particularly with him so close to being finished.
“Oh, never mind, I’m sure it’s just something that has happened with one of her little friends or something, I’m sure it will all blow over,” Isabelle said, not sure whether she was trying to convince Percy or herself.
She gave him a quick peck on the cheek just as Emily returned through the doorway, now wearing her scarlet cloak and a woollen hat. Percy patted Isabelle goodbye on the arm, took Emily’s hand and walked through the door.
“Your hat!” Isabelle yelled, seeing he had put it on the table while he pulled on his coat. But the sound of her cry was met with the slamming of the front door - they had already gone.
For the first time since she had returned home, Isabelle felt deeply troubled. Everything had seemed as though it were getting back to normal, and now this. What could Emily have possibly meant? Perhaps she had confused the question, so Isabelle wracked her mind for whether she had been on any recent outings into the nearby woods that Emily may have been confused about. But, hanging over this, was the brightly lit world ‘lived’ – Emily had definitely asked about when she had lived in the woods.
Had she said something to Emily about it after all? During her turn perhaps, and that’s why she didn’t remember? But that didn’t seem right, it was some time now that she had been home and Emily had only just sprung it on her, just like that.
Making it hard to work any of this out was the pull her memories of that time were now having on her. While she valiantly tried to stay in the present, to work out what was going on, and what she could possibly say to Emily when she came back – she was not prepared to lie to her daughter – she was drawn down an increasingly slippery slope to that time, to her forest life.
For the last few days it had been so close, somehow within arm’s reach everywhere she went. She couldn’t put her finger on why, but now felt that there must have been something in this strange proximity that had led to Emily’s probing query.
Absentmindedly, Isabelle fiddled with Percy’s hat. Its soft felt contoured to her fingers, acquiesced as she spun it, feeling its familiar shape in her hand. Without really thinking she placed it on her head, feeling it fall over her ears where Percy’s wider head must meet its band. She thought about how good Percy had been to her, keeping things going while she was away in the hospital, looking after the house, after Emily, still working to keep bread on the table and still finding time to come and see her.
She felt bad for having told him about what she had seen, as though it betrayed a weakness that she couldn’t deal with it herself. But she knew he would have wanted to know, knew that they shared absolutely everything; that they had done so ever since...
It was pointless trying not to think of the forest any more. Isabelle had long tried to bury that part of her life, but there was no way she could pretend it had never happened. Not least because that was where she had met Percy, the love of her life, the man for which she had risked everything, and who had now only recently saved her in return.
For a long time it really had seemed like a dream, or a particularly vivid story – somebody else’s – that she had read. Her parents had never read her any stories as a child, but Isabelle had still been in possession of a strong imagination. At times she could feel that this was the realm to which her time belonged, but now she knew there was something holding her back that was in there. She had to go back if she wished to move on.
Isabelle pulled the brim of Percy’s hat down over her eyes, allowing the curtains to be drawn on her present self and entering the memories that had been banking up and seeking release.
She had never told Emily about her time in the woods, or in fact anything from the time before Seaforth. Often Emily had asked about why the other children had grandparents and she didn’t, and where Percy and Isabelle had come from if they had not grown up in Seaforth, but they had always assured her that they would tell her everything when the time was right.
Her voice, trembling, caught in her throat, but she managed to get it out. “What did you just say?”
Emily gazed up at her with her piercing eyes and Isabelle suddenly felt like she had to close her mind off, that Emily was somehow reaching in there and seeing things without her saying a word.
“I asked about your time in the woods. I would like to hear about them.”
Before Isabelle could say anything, Percy came through the doorway. He had his hat in his hand and was just pulling on his coat, so Isabelle knew he was off to town.
“Percy love, why don’t you take Emily down with you? You know she loves a visit into town.”
“Hmmmm?” asked Percy absentmindedly, patting his coat pocket as though assuring himself that whatever it was he had in there had not mysteriously disappeared as he walked into the room.
“Oh yes, why not? Come along Emily, we’ll not be out too long and then you have the rest of the day.”
Isabelle watched Emily and saw she frowned her brow, before quickly forcing on a false smile. She knew Emily normally jumped at the chance to get down to the main street, so was perplexed at the cloud that passed over her. But if she had blinked she would have missed it, for Emily was now nodding at the idea, though a furtive glance thrown over her shoulder told Isabelle that her daughter seemed quite displeased at the prospect of being out with Percy.
“Go get something warm on Emily, so you don’t catch a chill.”
Emily slipped from her seat, and without further a word slipped out through the doorway.
“Percy?” Isabelle began. “Have you noticed anything at all… strange about Emily?”
“What? Oh no, not really. I mean she seems a little quiet at the moment, but then I daresay that’s not all that unusual, she definitely goes through these patches.”
What neither of them would say, but each must have known the other was thinking, was that Percy wouldn’t really have been able to tell if Emily had grown a second head and was speaking fluent Chinese. Percy knew as well as Isabelle that he could be a little vague and distracted while in one of his writing periods, but Isabelle was so proud of him that she did not dare burst his bubble with too much worry, particularly with him so close to being finished.
“Oh, never mind, I’m sure it’s just something that has happened with one of her little friends or something, I’m sure it will all blow over,” Isabelle said, not sure whether she was trying to convince Percy or herself.
She gave him a quick peck on the cheek just as Emily returned through the doorway, now wearing her scarlet cloak and a woollen hat. Percy patted Isabelle goodbye on the arm, took Emily’s hand and walked through the door.
“Your hat!” Isabelle yelled, seeing he had put it on the table while he pulled on his coat. But the sound of her cry was met with the slamming of the front door - they had already gone.
For the first time since she had returned home, Isabelle felt deeply troubled. Everything had seemed as though it were getting back to normal, and now this. What could Emily have possibly meant? Perhaps she had confused the question, so Isabelle wracked her mind for whether she had been on any recent outings into the nearby woods that Emily may have been confused about. But, hanging over this, was the brightly lit world ‘lived’ – Emily had definitely asked about when she had lived in the woods.
Had she said something to Emily about it after all? During her turn perhaps, and that’s why she didn’t remember? But that didn’t seem right, it was some time now that she had been home and Emily had only just sprung it on her, just like that.
Making it hard to work any of this out was the pull her memories of that time were now having on her. While she valiantly tried to stay in the present, to work out what was going on, and what she could possibly say to Emily when she came back – she was not prepared to lie to her daughter – she was drawn down an increasingly slippery slope to that time, to her forest life.
For the last few days it had been so close, somehow within arm’s reach everywhere she went. She couldn’t put her finger on why, but now felt that there must have been something in this strange proximity that had led to Emily’s probing query.
Absentmindedly, Isabelle fiddled with Percy’s hat. Its soft felt contoured to her fingers, acquiesced as she spun it, feeling its familiar shape in her hand. Without really thinking she placed it on her head, feeling it fall over her ears where Percy’s wider head must meet its band. She thought about how good Percy had been to her, keeping things going while she was away in the hospital, looking after the house, after Emily, still working to keep bread on the table and still finding time to come and see her.
She felt bad for having told him about what she had seen, as though it betrayed a weakness that she couldn’t deal with it herself. But she knew he would have wanted to know, knew that they shared absolutely everything; that they had done so ever since...
It was pointless trying not to think of the forest any more. Isabelle had long tried to bury that part of her life, but there was no way she could pretend it had never happened. Not least because that was where she had met Percy, the love of her life, the man for which she had risked everything, and who had now only recently saved her in return.
For a long time it really had seemed like a dream, or a particularly vivid story – somebody else’s – that she had read. Her parents had never read her any stories as a child, but Isabelle had still been in possession of a strong imagination. At times she could feel that this was the realm to which her time belonged, but now she knew there was something holding her back that was in there. She had to go back if she wished to move on.
Isabelle pulled the brim of Percy’s hat down over her eyes, allowing the curtains to be drawn on her present self and entering the memories that had been banking up and seeking release.
Thursday, 8 November 2007
Vinyl Diaries XII: Bill Callahan
Photo by fernando [pixelstains]
Bill Callahan
The Factory Theatre
Wednesday, November 7
If you're in or around Sydney and wondering what that low, humming sound is, you will find one Bill Callahan to blame. Weaving together painterly strokes of life, photographic snapshots taken through windows of strangers left open to catch the breeze, these misleadingly straightforward songs carry deep into the part of our minds that is responsible for our humming cords.
You'll have to excuse the mixed craftaphores above, but Callahan's songs seem to draw heavily on the visual as well as musical arts - subtle gradations of and shifts in colour, light and shading are of utmost importance.
With dark humour and a light touch he deftly opens our eyes to pockets of the world that exist mostly on the periphery of our vision (if at all), leaving traces of these lives indelibly printed on our hearts.
Having toured previously in solo mode as Smog and (Smog), this was the first chance to hear Callahan working with a band, drawing closer to the sounds of his prolific recorded output. The strength of their performance was quite remarkable given they were all local musicians, no doubt fairly hastily cobbled together for a short run of shows. On drums was the ever-more ubiquitous skinman savant Laurence Pike (Triosk/Pivot etc), with Tim Rogers (better known to most as Jack Ladder) on bass. The 'strings' billed for the show were fiddlers three, including Lara Goodridge of Fourplay.
Opening the set with 'Our Anniversary' from Supper, Callahan shares the droll tale of an anniversary night where the car keys have been hidden to keep itchy feet from fleeing:
It's our anniversary and you've hidden my keys
This is one anniversary you're spending with me
'Diamond Dancer' is an odd yet infectious little groove, and you know Callahan's into this ghost of Bowie number because his left leg does a little back kick from the knee - like that in a kiss on a bridge in a film you once saw.
And that's one point to mote about Callahan's music - it's odd. I suggested earlier it's an open window, but perhaps more accurately it's a fractured mirror. We're staring into it and while we may occasionally catch fragments of our own reflection, we're seeing, layered over this into a composite reflection of humanity, the lives of those beyond, the yet-met, the long-forgotten.
'Held' bounces in like the big old baby to which Callahan compares himself, the bass bumbling it along just so. It's a cheerful, smoky, Texas-flavoured chomp on a side of beef with lashings of sticky barbecue sauce.
This showier side warms the night up nicely, but the special moments are those that quieten, and a hush falls as the finger-picked opening to 'Teenage Spaceship' marks the first such moment.
Adept at turns of phrase that lift the corners of our mouths, Callahan lets the shell drop and twilight fall. You realise that while he looks closely at the audience between lines, drawing connections and truly appreciative for the interest, his eyes reflexively close as he sings each line. Though closed the lids remain wide - they're not clenched but veiled, alligator eyelids that he can somehow see through.
This twilight seems a natural fit for Callahan, reflective yet optimistic. The upbeat 'Sycamore' from this year's Woke on a Whaleheart pulls on the going-out boots, which we wear down to the stables for the rather insistent 'Let Me See The Colts'.
Throughout the ste, as those familar with his work would expect, there's something wonderfully soothing about Callahan's voice. He has a warm, mesmerising baritone that can't help but put you at ease. It seems drenched in honey, but even richer - royal jelly perhaps, a bee conspiracy.
Hand in hand with the loping, looping music it evokes autumn time and falling leaves, reds, oranges and browns, golden light under silver skies. He uses it beautifully in 'The Well', in which a foolish act spurred by frustration leads him to chance across an old abandoned well in the woods that demands to be yelled into:
I gave it a couple hoots
A hello
And a fuck all y'all
I guess everybody has their own thing
That they yell into a well
It's these moments in his story-telling that you think about your own life, its pace and direction and whether you are still in touch with enough of the simple things - when did you last let a river carry you in its current, how long since brambles nicked at your knee, what are you doing that can possibly match the joy of swearing down a well?
These questions and images travel with us as we weave down Callahan's river into b-side 'Bowery' and the haunting 'Say Valley Maker'
With the grace of a corpse
In a riptide
I let go
We let go too, feeling currents warm and cool cross paths. They steer us downriver into the splendid 'Bathysphere' where we reach the open mouth, our seven-year-old selves dreaming of life at sea, between coral, silent eel, silver swordfish.
"My home is the sea" we are assured... until, at the very end:
When I was seven
My father said to me
'But you can't swim'
And I've never dreamed of the sea again
That last line always slices like a knife - a twist in the tale that abruptly sends us crashing back to earth. Catpower's wonderful cover of the song on What Will the Community Think is perhaps more driven, hence a heavier crash at the end, but Callahan's near-whimsy in the lead-up makes it a more surprising turn.
We're now well and truly in the palm of his hands, so it's with tingly, overbrimming joy that I realise he has started playing 'River Guard', so minor and delicate a piece I had never dared hope it would make it to a live set.
But here he was, the prison guard with a heart of gold, sitting in the tall grass while his charges gain a rare glimpse of life as it could otherwise have been.
When I take the prisoners swimming
They have the time of their lives
I love to watch them floating
On their backs
Unburdened and relaxed
The gooseflesh he experiences later that night, standing on a cliff, watching wind rip the leaves from the trees, is the same we feel now, and that stays with us as he and the band leave the stage.
This is the Bill Callahan I love - that, if he retains a belief in his craft and his gift, could have him one day wearing the boots of Johnny Cash that no soul has been able to get near. He's got a long way to go and many more roads to travel (he's nudging 40), and may very well toss it all in for a back porch somewhere with lady-friend Joanna Newsom and a horde of shoeless mud-caked little people, but it's worth tagging along for the journey for as long as we're invited.
There is a truth, honesty and integrity to his stories, songwriting and performance that while not necessarily peerless, certainly stands heads and shoulders above the bulk of the singer-songwriter field. Which isn't to say we're privy to the full picture - there's more burbling beneath the surface than we've yet been allowed to discover; but in time...
To some, Callahan comes across as dispassionate, echoing Lou Reed in steadiness of tone and play with meter, but the passion is buried within and well worth scratching around to discover. At heart and adding to its likely longevity is a defiant optimism. It's small-scale and complicated by dreams that are a little beyond our reach, but it avoids all traces of resentment or bitterness. We see this in 'Hit the Ground Running' (not in tonight's set), in which he calls bitterness the lowest sin and paints a gruesome picture of the bitter man who rots within: "I've seen his smile/ Yellow and brown/ The bitterness is rotting down".
Returning to the stage, his foolish heart dives into the glittering 'Rock Bottom Riser', coming up for a breath of fresh country air 'In the Pines'. This gorgeous traditional song has a fragile moonlit beauty and a strange effect - anaesthetisising yet invigorating at the same time.
Closing out the evening, the upbeat near-jauntiness of the slide up the frets that is 'Cold Blooded Old Times' ensured toes would be tapped through the rest of the night, dreams would be hijacked with golden light-painted country cottages and days would be spent humming jewels from the treasure chest.
Having wondered what to expect of Mr Callahan finally stepping out from behind the Smog handle, there need have been no fear. The mask has dropped, the Smog has lifted; we are still in safe hands.
Tuesday, 30 October 2007
Vinyl Diaries XI: Radiohead - In Rainbows
Rainbows? Not exactly miserabilist material. But then neither, quite, have Radiohead ever comfortably fit the bill as moping marauders.
Posterchildren for the disaffected, perhaps, but those with at least a modicum of interest in the world beyond. While their albums have steered, at times, into near sociopathically paranoid territory, perversely revelling in android tendencies and industrial coldness, there’s always been a heart beating away in there – a tendency towards shedding the replicant’s tear.
Such has been their impact on the musical landscape since emerging from Oxfordshire in the early 1990s, a new Radiohead album can never simply arrive according to its own terms. The past rests heavily on each new outing’s shoulders, recent releases dealing with this by smashing any traces of a link with the past before they have a chance to find a foothold. It’s not a stretch to suggest that their 19997 opus OK Computer irrevocably changed the face of modern music, a multi-faceted monster that simultaneously tore the still beating heart out of the sickening rock beast and breathed new life into the decaying form.
The claustrophobic Kid A and its slow-burning late-born twin Amnesiac took a twist for the darker, while Hail to the Thief put the piano front and centre and ratcheted up the ice quotient, veering into a realm of electronic detachment and giving slightly too much rein to Thom Yorke’s maddened disconnect.
The long-awaited follow up was finally unveiled last week, a commercially courageous (yet ultimately savvy) decision to release it online without record label backing, with fans allowed to decide just how much they wished to pay. But gimmick or musical distribution model of the future, the simple and wonderful fact is 10 new Radiohead tracks are available, and in the context in which the band has always worked best – album form.
Opener 15 Step misleads with the electro-clap impulses of a semi-detached drum-machine, not a million miles from recent Yorke territory in last year’s solo outing The Eraser. But after Yorke drops a few vocal lines, the humans arrive in force. There’s an organic, jazz-flavoured licking from Jonny Greenwood’s crystal clear guitar, Yorke warbles through the next section over the top of Colin Greenwood’s bass murmuring along near-funkily, then, instead of a chorus as such, Yorke shimmers in as Jeff Buckley piped through a church organ.
Phil Selway’s complex beatkeeping breaks, snaps, crackles back into being – and then they’re gone.
Bodysnatchers swaggers in on a fuzzy, looping riff – an old-fashioned rock stomper that cuts through the skin, peels to the core of your being, appeals to emotional fraughtness rather than the intellect. It’s the long-lost missing link between Pablo Honey and The Bends, unapologetically abrasive and squallingly . Yorke’s in typical self-deprecating mode - “I’ve no idea what I’m talking about” - but the music just doesn’t back it up.
It thumps and stonks along on this rollicking rock plane until, suddenly, smack on the halfway mark, it tears headlong over the precipice – a gorgeous, bruising, soaring bridge bringing a quick run of shivers to the spine.
Has the light gone out for you?
Because the light's gone out for me
It is the 21st century
It is the 21st century
It's glorious, an unshackled freefall with the euphoria one experiences in a dream of flying, over far too soon and dropping you back into a squalling shambles of a noise-pit, hungry for more.
Avoiding the comfortable format of verse-chorus-verse, these tracks are being built in ways that seem a natural fit for the idea being expressed. The strongest point in the track is echoed throughout the album – occurring in the bridges, in which the extrapolation of the elementary ideas has taken place, taken hold, and the shackles are off. They, and we, are free to roam in this new place, a new space of imaginative freedom where nobody will laugh at you for falling.
Long-time live fan favourite Nude is the perfect comedown, wandering up a damp and dreary corridor with a ghostly passage of backsucking drums and Bjorky ooh-ooh-oohs, dropping away to reveal a bassline of Mogadon funk and gentle tacka-tacka-tacked drums, before Yorke’s echoing, plaintive, signature angel-whimper:
Don’t get any
big ideas
They’re not
gonna happen
Stripped back to blues-jazz flavoured guitar, vocals, bass and drums, it’s unadorned, warm-blooded, breathing, the human condition adrift in a cavernous darkening. Cue the sample wash, then Yorke’s first real soar skyward of the album – deliciously confusing, as it is with the word ‘sinking’. More oohs follow, then it’s gone.
Counted in on drum sticks, crystalline single guitar notes and then overlayed with handfuls of broken chords, Jonny Greenwood and Ed O'Brien's guitars tangling deliciously, Weird Fishes/Arpeggi is a bottom of the ocean swim through a tangle of lushly fecund reeds.
Again you actually picture a band, musicians playing to each other, for each other, chancing across the magical chemistry that has kept them yearning, stitched together for nigh on two decades. It’s the second track in a row that wouldn’t have found space on any of the last three albums, the mood too open, too natural, and one feels that Yorke’s solo album has freed up the band to explore new territory together, free of the electro-clinical albatross his dabbling was threatening to offer their exposed necks. It's not that the push towards these cold new boundaries wasn't welcome - it was an essential part of the Radiohead experience - but that it was threatening to become something of a new orthodoxy.
As the track progresses we’re sinking into the deepest ocean, drifting to the bottom of the sea. Yorke’s projecting out into the fish, but also drawing us with him. We’d be as crazy not to follow as he felt he would be, so we all weave amidst rocks phantom and real, perhaps searching for the near-mythical coy koi upon which Frank Black once chanced while on holiday from his mind.
This joyous underwater dive gets us three quarters of the way through, before we realise we really should have gone up for a breath much much earlier. It’s far too late now, and carried along by a sudden change in current, bright explosions in our mind as the oxygen entirely depletes in the form of the spangliest guitar undertow since Johnny Marr was but a Smith, we hit the bottom.
The track shimmers and glitters some more, light shattering as we look back through the ocean’s surface, absent-mindedly running our fingers against our scales and so comfortable in our new gills we don’t even wonder about them. Hidden at the very end, buried in the sand like a sunken gold sovereign, we hear Yorke’s chest voice, the rarely offered baritone we nearly never encounter these days, an alter-ego to the alter-ego reserved for a disarming dropping of the guard.
From the sea we travel into space, All I Need an open-sky odyssey that has Yorke waiting in the wings as angelic synths roll in, rippling around the growling, purring bass. It is a stripped back work of breathtaking beauty and heart-rending fragility – it’s Radiohead as the battered, heart-on-sleeve, baffled romantic, laying it all on the table for the world to see. Glistening glockenspiel gives it a bright innocence, until, once more, the safe ground crumbles beneath our feet and we’re thrust, along with handfuls of loose piano chord tumbles, into an Icelandic abyss reflecting a glacier blue hue borrowed from Sigur Ros.
Just as abruptly we’re tipped into Faust Arp, a strange, finger-picked acoustic guitar and string-swept folk-tinged affair. It’s modern folk yet without the psych or the freak, Nick Drake gone Mersyside.
Through headphones or well-spaced speakers the urgent coruscations of Reckoner offer disparate pieces playing in each ear - the left offering a 60s, Byrds inspired pop affair of tambourine and assorted other shakery, the right offering brilliantly broken beats and clangy cymbal stumbles. The two seemingly incompatible halves are allowed to drift in and out of their own parallel universes until the bass burbles in and the drums follow its looping bumble, the whole wonderful mess eventually sutured via plaintive falsetto, Yorke relishing his Dr Frankenstein stitching together of an album highlight.
The strings sweep back in for the bridge, the drums having dropped out to give them room, before all the goodies that have reared their head until now return. Divine melodies and optimistic progressions give it an air of hope, a move from minor keys into a more positive space than they may ever have inhabited.
This mood sticks around for House of Cards, yet there is ultimately something a little flat about the whole affair. It’s worthy enough in its own right, but too easily dealt with by that handful of dangerous tags – ‘pleasant’ perhaps being the most concerning. It drifts past without drawing the usual emotional response – there’s none of the sting in the tail we have come to crave. Perhaps it’s a grower, but I fear it’s a skipper.
A timely save comes with Jigsaw Falling Into Place, a rhythmically driven exhortation to ‘let it out’ and to dance - to dance the dance of the damned perhaps, but at least a dance to remember, a blunt instrument propelling us all gleefully along the road to ruin.
Album closer Videotape is the most pianofied track of the whole journey. Resting on a simple drum tack-boom, there is a pearly gate optimism difficult to recall anywhere in the Radiohead ouvre. Perfection is contemplated and – surprisingly - accepted .
No matter what happens now
I won't be afraid
Because I know today has been
The most perfect day
I’ve ever seen
Doubled piano chords high and low, tight drum rolls and stuttering tacka-tacks keep the space contemplative, the final lines echoing in our minds, a most un-Radiohead-like sentiment metronomically dropped and indelibly imprinted on the psyche as In Rainbows fades to black. The pot at the end of the rainbow reveals not gold as such, but life as it can be, a dream made real because, let’s face it, it’s there for the taking.
Surprising in its lack of grand gestures, histrionic propulsions and dramatic flourishes, there is a refreshing honesty throughout In Rainbows that is in reflection quite exhilarating. It is perhaps most groundbreaking in the sense there’s nothing groundbreaking about it at all. It doesn’t smash its way through, it doesn’t reinvent a wheel. It’s a band, five no-longer-lads from Abingdon, in love with music, perhaps even life, shamelessly, guiltlessly, displaying that love for the world to see.
The feeling is not that they are playing safe, but playing true. Muse can keep the overwrought drama queen territory they’ve carefully mined, Coldplay the syrupy hollowness over the emotional equivalent of a scraped knee. This newfound territory for Radiohead is both more moribund but – because of it – more true to life. It’s British but not the stiff upper lip; it’s the awareness of class, of difference, of struggle – personal and social – but with a newfound celebration of what can exist alongside and within all of that. If someone wants to be fitter, happier, and do so in a way at which they may once have reflexively sneered or despaired, they will, for now, be let be.
It’s not a return to any earlier stage, nor is it a complete exorcising of their last outing. Yet it’s undeniably, quintessentially Radiohead. The most striking thing is they seem comfortable in their own skin, finally happy to accept they are what they are and, as such, they have produced an unapologetic Radiohead album, soaked in the toys with which they love to play, the feints and glancing blows against normality in an unthinking sense, in favour of an aware position, an understanding of self in relation to a wider picture.
We don’t need to stop the fight for what we believe in, but we can occasionally let down our guard, smile at what we love, touch what we cherish, revel in the golden rays of sun peeking from beneath the approaching (or passing) storm.
Friday, 19 October 2007
The Music Box: Chapter Fifty-One
Emily had to get out. Somewhere in this book, she knew, must lie the answer to how she could get her life back on track, undo the damage she had done by going behind her mother’s back and seeking out the music box from Aloysius Crouch, knowing all along that it wasn’t the right thing to do.
She realised she was getting nowhere by simply being angry at herself for having led them all into this mess. She had to come up with a way forward and dwelling on the past was not going to help.
Placing the book in a pocket inside the coat, she looked around to see if there was anything else that might prove of any use. It was all pretty much as she remembered it, although something further down the bench did catch her eye. She wondered if it had been there the first time – a round, wooden, tubular device that looked like a small telescope.
Emily walked over and gingerly picked it up. It felt quite heavy for its size and as she turned it over in her hands, she saw that it did have an eyepiece – perhaps it was a telescope after all? On closer inspection it seemed more like a kaleidoscope, a glass dome perched at the other end.
Emily raised it to her eye, but couldn’t make anything out. She began to wonder what Crouch used it for and was startled to find his image suddenly appear. She almost dropped it, but realising he wasn’t in fact in the room she managed to keep him in sight. She watched as he picked up the device, placing it to his own eye, twisting it around for a few moments, then making some notes in his book with his quill.
Emily’s mind turned to Minerva, and Crouch’s image slowly faded to be replaced by that of Minerva at home in her subterranean sanctuary, deep in discussion with both Topkinses.
Lastly, Emily pictured her mother. As Minerva disappeared from sight, her mother replaced her. She looked happy and well, working on the garden of their home. Emily knew the image could be coming from any time, that she couldn’t be too certain that all was still okay, yet she felt a reassurance at having at least seen her mother after what felt like so long away.
She placed the ‘spyroscope’ (as she thought of it) in another coat pocket and turned for the door. There was much to be done and Emily had to get somewhere she could think.
***
Emily opened the door and stepped through into the empty shopfront, better able to see it than her first time through, her eyes far better adjusted to the gloom.
She saw now the shop must have once been a toy store. Along the wall there still remained shelves that held a few spinning tops, some books and a few troubled looking dolls. Emily wondered what those dolls must have seen, who they may have witnessed coming and going from this place, what secretive business they were here upon.
Making her way to the front door, Emily turned the handle and was shocked by just how bright it was outside. She lost her footing as she stepped over the threshold, not noticing the street was a little below door level. Her hat tumbled off her head and rolled a little way down the street. Leaning down to pick it up, she was surprised to see Trixie Sopworth, a girl in her year at school.
“Trixie!” she exclaimed before thinking, so pleased to see a familiar face after all this time. She realised her mistake just as she saw the petrified look in Trixie’s face. To be addressed by Mr Crouch would have been bad enough, for him to know your name would be truly terrifying. She knew there was little she could do to allay Trixie’s fears so she quickly dusted of the cap, placed it on her head as she regained full height and stepped quickly down the street.
Emily knew she was heading the wrong way, but catching a fresh waft of the harbour, she knew this was the place to go to clear her head and work out her next step. Passing the last of the street’s shops, she stepped out into the cobbled road, passed the whitewashed Pig and Whistle inn with its gently swinging sign and turned the corner, a blast of sea breeze stinging her eyes as she stepped onto the rickety pier.
Sea birds hovering nearby took off as she neared, their soft white feathers fleeing from the black coated intruder, circling warily and keeping a safe distance. Their harsh throaty cries layered and built with neither rhyme nor reason; a messy noise far from that of the tuneful twittering of those living further up the hill in the glens and dales she would occasionally wander when given free rein to disappear for the day.
She had often wondered at the life of the sea birds and how different it was to their cousins up the hill. They were separated by only a mile or two, but their worlds could not have been more disparate. The sparrows and starlings seemed to Emily very much home bodies. They may dart and dash here and there and poke about for bugs and worms when hungry, singing out their lovelorn whistling at others, but she knew they spent much of their time attending to fairly domestic duties, improving their nests, picking for it choice twigs and preparing it for laying.
Their colouring was complex – mottled, speckled, browns and blacks and reds and yellows and blues, while no two of their songs ever seemed the same.
These sea birds, on the other hand, the gulls and terns and cormorants, were almost uniformly black, white or grey. While they would hover in the same places, it never seemed to Emily that this was home. It was certainly their territory – Emily had seen some quite territorial behaviour by certain characters – but it seemed more like a marriage of convenience to a location that supplied them with enough fish scraps to fight over than any true link with the place.
Their cries seemed so base, greedy, always warnings rather than greetings, spiteful rather than playful.
She wondered at how little interaction there was between the two worlds, how rare it had been to see these sea birds up in the hills. Occasionally she would see them soaring high above them, but never landing and exploring, showing any curiosity about this green and brown world so differently textured and populated than their own grey and blue.
Once she had seen a lone sparrow hopping along the shoreline, as though looking for something it had lost – little sparrow spectacles or such. As the waves crashed into the beach and the suddsy wake washed up the shore, the sparrow looked so out of place, so dwarfed by the sea, she suddenly feared for its safety. It must have been innocent to the sea’s power, her ability to spring a fatal surprise as easily and thoughtlessly as a person might sneeze.
She watched it travel further and further up the beach, losing sight of it before she could be certain it would be able to return home safely. She wanted to follow it, to make sure it was okay, but knew she had to let it be, do its own thing regardless of the consequences.
Before this she had thought the sea birds somewhat simple and lacking in the charm of the hill birds, but seeing the sparrow up against the sea she realised she had been looking at the sea birds through unfair eyes. Now she saw their inner grace, the way they danced and tussled with the sea, the manner in which they were effortlessly at ease with her, in tune with her rhythms and pulses. She would watch them glide along invisible currents and soar with the updrafts, now almost disdainful of the hill birds and their nervous, stuttering flights that seemed in contrast so random, at odds with nature rather than one with her.
She never failed to thrill at that moment, that brave flash of courage and certainty, when they would soar up, up, up, and then plunge – a vertical missile ploughing through the sea’s barrier at break-neck speed, a precision dive that penetrated the unknown.
Emily had by now reached the end of the pier. She sat with her side resting against a white painted pylon, dangling Crouch’s long, thin legs from under the coat over the edge of the drop. The wind was a quite solid gale, lifting spray into her face as she kept her eyes open, smelling deeply of its freshening promise. There really was no better way to clear the mind, scour the jumble of thoughts and fears, except perhaps to plunge into her depths, feeling the buffeting waves tumble and toss you, all your thoughts spent on breath and survival and leaving no room for day-to-day trivialities.
While she longed painfully to run up to her home, throw open the door and confront Crouch for his wrongdoings, Emily knew this approach was impossible. She could try explaining to her mother what had happened, but how would she even get her to listen, let alone have any chance of convincing her?
And even if she did, what of it? She was still trapped in Crouch’s body, Crouch in full control of hers. There was no way she could ever hope to have her old life back if she lost her chance of drawing Crouch back to his chamber, finding a way to swap their bodies back. Emily closed her eyes, letting the sound envelope her. There was a guilty pleasure in all this, knowing her mother rarely brought her down to the sea.
She loved it here and she would often wonder at why they didn’t spend more time down by the harbour, or further along the coast where the village tapered out and only a few rough shacks, inhabited by silent, bearded men, shirtless, linen pants held up by a rough twist of rope around the waist, seemingly forever drunk on salt and sun.
Emily took a deep, salty breath, reached into her pocket, took out Crouch’s book and began to read.
She realised she was getting nowhere by simply being angry at herself for having led them all into this mess. She had to come up with a way forward and dwelling on the past was not going to help.
Placing the book in a pocket inside the coat, she looked around to see if there was anything else that might prove of any use. It was all pretty much as she remembered it, although something further down the bench did catch her eye. She wondered if it had been there the first time – a round, wooden, tubular device that looked like a small telescope.
Emily walked over and gingerly picked it up. It felt quite heavy for its size and as she turned it over in her hands, she saw that it did have an eyepiece – perhaps it was a telescope after all? On closer inspection it seemed more like a kaleidoscope, a glass dome perched at the other end.
Emily raised it to her eye, but couldn’t make anything out. She began to wonder what Crouch used it for and was startled to find his image suddenly appear. She almost dropped it, but realising he wasn’t in fact in the room she managed to keep him in sight. She watched as he picked up the device, placing it to his own eye, twisting it around for a few moments, then making some notes in his book with his quill.
Emily’s mind turned to Minerva, and Crouch’s image slowly faded to be replaced by that of Minerva at home in her subterranean sanctuary, deep in discussion with both Topkinses.
Lastly, Emily pictured her mother. As Minerva disappeared from sight, her mother replaced her. She looked happy and well, working on the garden of their home. Emily knew the image could be coming from any time, that she couldn’t be too certain that all was still okay, yet she felt a reassurance at having at least seen her mother after what felt like so long away.
She placed the ‘spyroscope’ (as she thought of it) in another coat pocket and turned for the door. There was much to be done and Emily had to get somewhere she could think.
***
Emily opened the door and stepped through into the empty shopfront, better able to see it than her first time through, her eyes far better adjusted to the gloom.
She saw now the shop must have once been a toy store. Along the wall there still remained shelves that held a few spinning tops, some books and a few troubled looking dolls. Emily wondered what those dolls must have seen, who they may have witnessed coming and going from this place, what secretive business they were here upon.
Making her way to the front door, Emily turned the handle and was shocked by just how bright it was outside. She lost her footing as she stepped over the threshold, not noticing the street was a little below door level. Her hat tumbled off her head and rolled a little way down the street. Leaning down to pick it up, she was surprised to see Trixie Sopworth, a girl in her year at school.
“Trixie!” she exclaimed before thinking, so pleased to see a familiar face after all this time. She realised her mistake just as she saw the petrified look in Trixie’s face. To be addressed by Mr Crouch would have been bad enough, for him to know your name would be truly terrifying. She knew there was little she could do to allay Trixie’s fears so she quickly dusted of the cap, placed it on her head as she regained full height and stepped quickly down the street.
Emily knew she was heading the wrong way, but catching a fresh waft of the harbour, she knew this was the place to go to clear her head and work out her next step. Passing the last of the street’s shops, she stepped out into the cobbled road, passed the whitewashed Pig and Whistle inn with its gently swinging sign and turned the corner, a blast of sea breeze stinging her eyes as she stepped onto the rickety pier.
Sea birds hovering nearby took off as she neared, their soft white feathers fleeing from the black coated intruder, circling warily and keeping a safe distance. Their harsh throaty cries layered and built with neither rhyme nor reason; a messy noise far from that of the tuneful twittering of those living further up the hill in the glens and dales she would occasionally wander when given free rein to disappear for the day.
She had often wondered at the life of the sea birds and how different it was to their cousins up the hill. They were separated by only a mile or two, but their worlds could not have been more disparate. The sparrows and starlings seemed to Emily very much home bodies. They may dart and dash here and there and poke about for bugs and worms when hungry, singing out their lovelorn whistling at others, but she knew they spent much of their time attending to fairly domestic duties, improving their nests, picking for it choice twigs and preparing it for laying.
Their colouring was complex – mottled, speckled, browns and blacks and reds and yellows and blues, while no two of their songs ever seemed the same.
These sea birds, on the other hand, the gulls and terns and cormorants, were almost uniformly black, white or grey. While they would hover in the same places, it never seemed to Emily that this was home. It was certainly their territory – Emily had seen some quite territorial behaviour by certain characters – but it seemed more like a marriage of convenience to a location that supplied them with enough fish scraps to fight over than any true link with the place.
Their cries seemed so base, greedy, always warnings rather than greetings, spiteful rather than playful.
She wondered at how little interaction there was between the two worlds, how rare it had been to see these sea birds up in the hills. Occasionally she would see them soaring high above them, but never landing and exploring, showing any curiosity about this green and brown world so differently textured and populated than their own grey and blue.
Once she had seen a lone sparrow hopping along the shoreline, as though looking for something it had lost – little sparrow spectacles or such. As the waves crashed into the beach and the suddsy wake washed up the shore, the sparrow looked so out of place, so dwarfed by the sea, she suddenly feared for its safety. It must have been innocent to the sea’s power, her ability to spring a fatal surprise as easily and thoughtlessly as a person might sneeze.
She watched it travel further and further up the beach, losing sight of it before she could be certain it would be able to return home safely. She wanted to follow it, to make sure it was okay, but knew she had to let it be, do its own thing regardless of the consequences.
Before this she had thought the sea birds somewhat simple and lacking in the charm of the hill birds, but seeing the sparrow up against the sea she realised she had been looking at the sea birds through unfair eyes. Now she saw their inner grace, the way they danced and tussled with the sea, the manner in which they were effortlessly at ease with her, in tune with her rhythms and pulses. She would watch them glide along invisible currents and soar with the updrafts, now almost disdainful of the hill birds and their nervous, stuttering flights that seemed in contrast so random, at odds with nature rather than one with her.
She never failed to thrill at that moment, that brave flash of courage and certainty, when they would soar up, up, up, and then plunge – a vertical missile ploughing through the sea’s barrier at break-neck speed, a precision dive that penetrated the unknown.
Emily had by now reached the end of the pier. She sat with her side resting against a white painted pylon, dangling Crouch’s long, thin legs from under the coat over the edge of the drop. The wind was a quite solid gale, lifting spray into her face as she kept her eyes open, smelling deeply of its freshening promise. There really was no better way to clear the mind, scour the jumble of thoughts and fears, except perhaps to plunge into her depths, feeling the buffeting waves tumble and toss you, all your thoughts spent on breath and survival and leaving no room for day-to-day trivialities.
While she longed painfully to run up to her home, throw open the door and confront Crouch for his wrongdoings, Emily knew this approach was impossible. She could try explaining to her mother what had happened, but how would she even get her to listen, let alone have any chance of convincing her?
And even if she did, what of it? She was still trapped in Crouch’s body, Crouch in full control of hers. There was no way she could ever hope to have her old life back if she lost her chance of drawing Crouch back to his chamber, finding a way to swap their bodies back. Emily closed her eyes, letting the sound envelope her. There was a guilty pleasure in all this, knowing her mother rarely brought her down to the sea.
She loved it here and she would often wonder at why they didn’t spend more time down by the harbour, or further along the coast where the village tapered out and only a few rough shacks, inhabited by silent, bearded men, shirtless, linen pants held up by a rough twist of rope around the waist, seemingly forever drunk on salt and sun.
Emily took a deep, salty breath, reached into her pocket, took out Crouch’s book and began to read.
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