JOURNAL
documenting
&
discovering joyful things
Last night
A warm and welcoming home; children smiling, cheezles tinting fingers orange; meeting new friends like they are old friends; devouring casserole, couscous and homemade strudel; elegantly About freedom
Freedom, I used to have it. At least, I had it in the traditional way that we see the word.
I'm not trying to get too deep here, I'm only really talking about fairly superficial freedoms. You know, the freedom to buy those $400 shoes if you really want them. The freedom to take that holiday you can't exactly afford because, dammit, you know you need it. Even the freedom to downsize your apartment and sell the car in order to save money so that one day you can buy those shoes or take that holiday.
All these things represent freedom. Your choice as to how you spend your time and money, how you make plans, even how you make sacrifices.
In the space of 18 months, I have traded in a life of freedom (read: living in SoHo New York as a freelance writer, popping over to London or Peru when I felt like it, traipsing up to Maine for lobster, Rhode Island to research vampires, or down to New Mexico to watch the sky, all while wearing my admittedly several seasons old but still pretty Gucci, Stella McCartney and Louis Vuitton shoes)...
...For a life that definitely does not fit the standard definition of freedom. I am back in Australia which, by its geographical isolation alone, makes travel a much more expensive and significant undertaking. I am married (no more travel romances for me, although that's how I met Mr B, which is another story for another time). I have inherited two beautiful teenaged daughters. I have undertaken two much less beautiful mortgages. But we don't live in either of the houses we're paying off. This means renting, so: no garden, no painting or fixing up the house, no nesting.
And I couldn't be happier.
After all, what's freedom, really? Is it being unfettered? I don't think so. I think freedom is the opportunity to choose, and I am well aware that I represent a very lucky minority in this world that has that opportunity.
The life I have now is more richly rewarding, more challenging, and more surprising than anything I had before. It is also filled to the brim with love. I choose this life.
What does freedom mean to you?
Sunshine in winter (+ other things not so bad about Queensland)
This blog has been brought to you from the Gold Coast in Queensland, Australia, for the past two months. We have one more month to go before we move back down to cooler climes.
I have been complaining about living here but that just goes to show how ungrateful I am, and that I need an attitude readjustment. To show I've made my peace with Queensland, I wanted to bring you these sweet scenes from my daily walk with the dog.
And by way of apology to the northern State, here are some other lovely things about Queensland that I hope will cheer your day and inspire your weekend.
* Shopping at the BrisStyle indie markets for something unique and handmade * Free music on Sunday afternoon in the Bond University amphitheatre overlooking the lake * Treasure hunting at the Woollongabba Antique Centre in Brisbane * Eggs for breakfast on Sunday at Vintage Espresso in Mermaid Beach * Musings and tidbits from reading this Queenslander's blog
Golden ticket day off
Today I had a golden ticket day off. An unplanned free day, taken after working all weekend, that belonged entirely to me. No errands, no clients to please, no need to even check my emails or pick up the phone. So I didn't. The day was all mine, and it was perfect.
I took a cup of tea out onto the balcony, where Ruby and I read the latest Frankie magazine. Then I made a second cup of tea and kept on reading.
I grabbed a supply of little blue bags and took Oliver, the world's happiest dog, for a walk along the Broadwater.
Waved to the tourists on the Aquaduck as they chugged under the bridge. (Seriously, who doesn't want to ride an amphibious bus?)
When I got to Main Beach...
I sat in the sand and had a club sandwich and drank sparkling mineral water. I read Cathedral, a short story by Raymond Carver, a story that was really an experience and stayed with me for the entire walk home.
Back at the apartment, I wrote a scene for my new novel, in which my protagonist Kevin, an obsessive sommelier who finds magic in wine, got mugged on a train station in the London underground. I also honed the backstory in which Kevin's mother was killed.
Mr B came home from work, carrying a bottle of sparkling wine under one arm and a large box hoisted in the other. Look what arrived in the mail, ready for the book launch party for Airmail in Sydney next month!
I simmered up a super spicy chicken and vegetable red curry while listening to Bob Dylan, followed by dessert of frozen berries blended with yoghurt, honey and mint and topped with shaved chocolate (thank you, Jamie Oliver).
Finally, I settled in for the evening with my darling to drink my bubbles and watch last night's episode of Downton Abbey online.
This was a really good day. A golden ticket day. Thank you, universe.
Vampires of mercy
Exeter, Rhode Island, USA: windswept and remote. As climate and vegetation go, this is about as far from Sookie Stackhouse's steamy Bon Temps, Louisiana, as it's possible for you to get.
But Exeter and Bon Temps have more than one thing in common. They are both beautiful and strange American wildernesses. In the backwaters of Exeter, you can still encounter deep forests, dirt roads, old folks playing checkers in the dust outside the corner store, and folklore that is thick with vampires, ghosts and witches. Just like Bon Temps, Exeter is a tiny rural community, where more than one family has lived for many a generation.
And the two towns have something else in common: they are both home to vampires. The key, however, is that neither Exeter nor its vampires are fictitious. To a point.
Meet Exeter local Mercy Brown. She is young, sweet, and pretty. Like many of her friends, she spends her afternoons carefully stitching together a blue, patchwork coverlet, and her evenings dreaming of being a good wife and mother.
Spent, I should say. When she was 19, Mercy contracted tuberculosis, known as the consumption. She lost weight and suffered terribly from fever and fatigue. She began coughing up blood. Poor Mercy knew what to expect, her sister and mother had already died of the same disease.
Tuberculosis ended Mercy's first life in the depth of winter, on 17 January, 1892. Her grieving father had her body placed in the crypt at the cemetery behind Chestnut Hill Baptist Church, to wait until the earth thawed before he could bury her body in the ground.
But according to the good people of Exeter, Mercy did not rest. Soon after her death, neighbours reported seeing her walking about town.
Then Mercy's brother Edwin fell ill with the same disease.
Many of the townsfolk began muttering. It was not tuberculosis but ‘vampirism’ that was killing the Brown family, they speculated. In 18th and 19th century Rhode Island, vampires preferred to kill in the family, sometimes taking the lives of one sibling after another until all were dead.
I visited Mercy on a sweltering August afternoon two years ago. Her sun-filled cemetery was bordered on both sides by centuries-old dry-stone walls, a feature of New England landscapes that dates back to the region’s pre Civil War plantations.
At first look, her grave differed from those around it only by the heavy metal brace that secured her headstone to the ground – a necessary security to protect Mercy from her myriad ‘fans’ – and the flowers and gifts that, more than a hundred years after her final passing, were a touching sign that Mercy was still remembered.
But it was only when I found the vine-covered stone crypt at the edge of the graveyard, and a small stone with a dark history nearby, that Mercy’s grisly story, made famous by a Providence Journal report in 1892, felt real.
"During the few weeks past, Mr. Brown has been besieged on all sides by a number of people who expressed implicit faith in the old theory that by some unexplained and unreasonable way in some part of the deceased relative’s body live flesh and blood might be found, which is supposed to feed upon the living who are in feeble health.
"Mr. Brown, having no confidence in the old-time theory, and also getting no encouragement from the medical fraternity, did not yield to their importunities until yesterday afternoon, when an investigation was held under the direction of Harold Metcalf, M.D., of Wickford."
Mercy's neighbours, it transpired, believed she was a vampire, feeding upon her family members. With Dr Metcalf in attendance, they removed Mercy from the crypt and cut her open.
To their horror it appeared that Mercy’s body had moved in her coffin. Moreover, her body was not as deteriorated as they expected, and she had unusual colour in her cheeks. Dr Metcalf examined Mercy’s heart and liver. Her heart, when cut open, still retained fresh, red blood.
Mercy was not the first vampire case in Rhode Island, a State which by then was rumoured to be the vampire capital of America, and the locals knew what to do. Let me prepare you, this is horrific. And true.
They cut out Mercy's heart and burned it on a nearby rock, an action they believed would prevent her from walking again.
As if that were not grisly enough, they saved the ashes of Mercy’s heart, mixed them with water, and gave them to her ailing brother Edwin to drink. Drinking the ashes of a vampire’s heart was supposed to cure their victims. Edwin died two months later.
I left Rhode Island after two weeks with more questions than I'd had at the start. I'd visited the resting places of several ‘girl-vampires’. Victims, I believe, of a society trying to confront the spread of a disease that was both selective and deadly.
But while I left with a sense of unease, there was also wonder. Rhode Island folklore can be taken both ways, just like the chilling – or loving – inscription on the 1889 tombstone of yet another of its abused vampires, Nelly Vaughn of West Greenwich, who died at 19:
“I am waiting and watching for you.”
Things I did at the Brookfield Show
* Mistakenly assumed a security guy in the bar area would like to see my bag for purposes of ascertaining lack of firearms and/or illegal liquor, thereby inadvertently humiliating myself when all around me thought I felt the need to prove my over-18 status* Ditched the still-laughing security guy and faked being a steward in order to get into the Pony Club area instead, to watch the rodeo
* Watched rodeo, during which a cowboy dude was spun through the air (horizontal to the ground) by a rather pissed off bull
* Watched second cowboy dude narrowly miss being gored to death by an extremely pissed off bull
* Quickly turned back on rodeo and returned attention to alcohol
* Purchased this jar of delicious lime marmalade (it was full at the time):
* Strongly urged a friend to "Take the banana Rasta! Take the banana Rasta!" after he was a DOUBLE WINNER at the lucky numbers (which stroke of good fortune inspired Mr B to excitedly chant "Winner winner chicken dinner" at intermittent intervals throughout the rest of the evening)
* Had dizzying brush with fame via proximity to Sigrid Thornton's brother's award-winning preserves, on display in Cookery Pavilion
* Vicariously purchased two lovely watercolours from the Art Pavilion, by way of encouraging friends to do so instead
* Experienced rather odd sensation of having forefinger mistaken for a sheep's nipple and suckled by lamb at petting zoo
* Purchased and ate an entire bag of coconut ice, then immediately began growing pimple on chin which had fully matured by the next morning
* Did not step in cow pat. Not even once!
Afternoon
Today my friend Ruby took me on a lightening tour of the Gold Coast, to show me where the arts, the buzz, the cafes, the restaurants and the views sat. I am grateful, enlightened, and a little more at peace with the idea of living here. Also, my friend Ruby gave me a bag of fruit picked from the trees at her home on the hinterland. Said trees are, apparently, FREAKY MUTANT STEROID trees. Behold, the mother of all limes:
I am going to make mojitos. You bet your BOOTY I am going to make mojitos.
Mutant species: kangaroo-dog
Proof! The species are mingling, powerful new genetic mutants are emerging. Ladies and gentlemen I present: the amazing kangaroo-dog.
Apparently, these are the blog posts that my brain believes are worthy at 3.30am. I suspect my 7.30am brain will apologise, so I am doing so now, in advance. Sorry! Still, I am enjoying the concept of the kangaroo-dog somewhat.
I am also rather on tenterhooks to bring you photographic evidence of another mutant species I encountered tonight: the Bikini Barbers. Yes, you read correctly. A barber shop where all the hairdressers wear bikinis. I assume they are women, although I'm hoping...
I passed this little gem of Queensland culture when it was closed, so had to content myself with reading a big sign displaying all the rules (such as "look but don't touch," and "no lewd comments"), but you can bet your booties I will be back in daylight!
Possibly I will need to hide behind a tree and take my photograph using a long-range lens (that I don't have), just as I imagine many a peeping tom has done before me. But this, my friends, is the strength of my commitment to excellence in journalism.
Stay tuned. In the meantime, I bid you Adieu