About 18 months after my first child was born, I found myself at an IT journalists' awards night, the sort of self-congratulatory event I generally hated because I’d long before reached the conclusion that most journos were self-important bores whose conversational repertoire only extended as far as how great they were, and their latest scoop. So why was I there? I was a senior editor on a national paper - I think we were up for some gongs and so it would’ve been bad optics not to attend. Besides, despite loathing the company of most journos, there were some old colleagues I liked, and it was a good opportunity to catch up. And unlike most journos, I generally found the PR folks in attendance to be good value, with a much richer world view and more interesting ways of looking at things than many of those on the other side of the fence. The drinks were also free: it would take a brave person to stand between a hack and complimentary booze. After the cerem...
I stood in the darkness looking out over the smooth, inky waters of Broken Bay, the streetlights on the headland at Palm Beach reflected below. I could make out the silhouettes of moored boats, some with illuminated cabins. “There are people in those yachts,” I thought, suddenly overwhelmed by the sheer mass of humanity. It hit me that every one of those folks has their own hopes, fears, and dreams for the future. We’re unique, but in some ways the same. As I gazed at the streetlights across the water, the realisation came upon me: those lights spelled out a message from God, a personal communication from the creator to me. I lingered a little longer in the shadows thinking about what I’d seen before walking back to the low stone wall at the West Head lookout where my friends sat passing a joint back and forth, chatting in low voices. My turn came around, I took a deep drag and held the smoke in my lungs before slowly exhaling. I didn’t tell my friends what had happ...
It was that liminal moment when one class has finished but you’ve yet to make your way to the next period. She walked out onto the veranda of the demountable building school had installed while the permanent classrooms at the ‘new school’ were being built and told me to wait a ‘sec. I had probably lingered longer outside class than was strictly necessary. Next period was maths and both the subject and teacher – Mrs Grindley, who oversaw enforcing uniform violations by doing things like getting the girls to kneel and then measuring the distance from the bottom hem of their skirts to the ground, and whose extremely hairy legs were visible through the sheer stockings she wore in winter – were not favourites. English, on the other hand, was a favourite. I loved reading and I loved books. And our new year ten English teacher, Miss Cusack, was excellent. She made the books come to life, and I looked forward to her classes. It was 1988. The Bicentennial Year. I’d bee...
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