Greatest Hits

Recalling the past is a difficult and dangerous thing. It can bring back some terrible memories, blurred on the edge of nightmare and reality. Sometimes, the past is the only thing holding you back, preventing you from going where you want to go, stopping you from never saying never.

But sometimes, on your darkest day or your coldest night, memories are all you have. When I think about the past, about my sorry excuse for a life, it's ever so difficult to pick the best moments. My greatest hits. I wonder what I will see if my life ever flashes before my eyes?

I think back to year 7 camp at the cricket ground, and running the Christmas Island marathon with some of my closest friends. I'm sleeping out under the stars at Dolly Beach, damming the fresh water streams and listening to the waves crash against the rocks, and watching the massive mother turtles struggle against all odds up the beach to lay their eggs. I see me performing with my best mate Sione in the 2003 circus, and acting in the play Karaoke Kristmas, getting to play out some of the most monumental moments in Christmas Island's fascinating history.

I'll never forget the geography trip to Northam eating one of Mr. Carters famous curry pies at Bakers Hill, and going to Cott beach on a hot summers afternoon to celebrate finishing our last ever TEE exam. And graduation night, and Leavers, which was an absolute blast sleeping on the beach (illegally), and scrambling around the Leavers party trying to find anyone who resembled a friend!

And then I come to my time at uni. By a long, long way the best two and a half years of my life! Not just because of the epic Tav sessions or the parties, or rocking out to Dan's guitar, or $4 pasta Wednesdays, but the little things as well. Like sitting in the common room waiting for the Cell Biology lecture in the random shed, spending countless hours watching Transformers, Indiana Jones and Once; the movie with not nearly enough explosions. There's swimming in my undies at Leighton Beach with Alex and a whole bunch of random people I had only just met, and that field trip to Harry Waring Marsupial Reserve (and the crazy dataset that ensued!). I think about waiting with Lina for what seemed like hours in the cue for the toilets at Oktoberfest, and being one of the founding members of the CEBC, and getting out of a cab with Cass in god-knows-where, falling into a prickle patch and somehow making it back to Nicola's house alive. 

Of course, there are other memories, almost 20 years worth in fact, which all could pass through my brain the moment I die; dodging crabs on my bike on CI, Silly Softball, my first girlfriend, watching Sachin Tendulkar bat at the WACA, crying after Australia got knocked out of the 2006 world cup, random tree climbing, Hank-Anthony moments, chasing the elusive stingray with Vince and Max, epic 5-way chain-spoons and many, many more.

Looking back on the past is a difficult thing, but it is also a wonderful thing. Writing this post has made me feel quite up-beat, and emotional, in a good way. So I encourage you, dear reader, to get out a piece of paper and scribble down some of your favourite memories, you might feel better for it! 

What are your greatest hits?

Empty

It's so difficult to describe the way I'm feeling right now. I've been feeling this way for weeks. The closest thing that comes to mind is empty. It's like there is an invisible parasite sucking the life out of me; the energy, the care, the laughter.

There's no discernible reason as to why I am feeling this way. Like a tropical island fantasy (hammock and palm trees aside) life is warm, breezy, and protected. I have an awesome family and the most beautiful friends. I try to sit back and enjoy life, I really do. But no matter what I do, where I go, who I'm with, I can't seem to shake this feeling of emptiness.

Life is just so absurdly boring at home. I look around at the hollow faces in my posters, watching me with their blank stares; sometimes I swear they are mocking me. I actually go into uni, even on days when I don't have classes, and I sit around in the common room, and pray that someone walks through that door. Good things happen at uni. There are people there that can make me feel better, make me feel alive again. Albeit briefly.

And all of it makes me feel so tired and drained, but I just can't sleep. I toss and turn and sweat. I wake up constantly through the night. I haven't had a good nights sleep in days and days. There's something wrong, something haunting the subliminals of my mind. That I do know. I also know that someday soon the emptiness will go away. Inevitably, someone will burst in that door exorcise me of this horrible feeling, something will happen which will help me find my direction.

It's just waiting for the inevitability which is the hardest part.

Missing Lost

I hope my friends appreciate what I do for them.

I hadn't missed an episode of Lost since season 3, episode 19: The Brig, until last night. It's now 9 episodes into season 6. That's 37 episodes in a row. I don't know if my friends can truly fathom how much it hurts me to not be in front of a TV at 8:30 on a Wednesday night. What have they turned me into?

There are only 9 episodes of Lost left for heavens sake. Nine. In nine weeks time my life will be ripped from under my feet and I will be dropped back into the real world like a piece of trash. My heart will be torn into millions of tiny little pieces, and each of those pieces will stabbed with a blunt and rusty object. I'm never going to be able to witness a TV epic anything like this ever again. And yet I'm going out on a Wednesday night for what, half price cocktails? Please. 

Every time I took my phone out of my pocket and looked at the time, my heart jerked. Butterflies filled my guts. 8:42. It's already started! 9:15. Shit, I've missed it! 10:30. There's still enough time, if I take the next train, to catch the encore screening! I had to take some pretty deep breaths to stop myself from running for that door. Maybe a couple of years a go I would have. Maybe with some lesser friends I would have.

But you know what? I had the time of my pathetic little life last night. And this time I wasn't sitting on the edge of my seat in front of the TV, sweating on the outrageous cliffhanger that was taking place before my eyes, listening to Giacchino thumping through my veins. I actually enjoyed a social situation more than I enjoyed Lost. True, my friends could never replace Lost as my primary form of love and dedication, but I love my friends none the less. I must do, missing Lost and all. 

Hell, I might even miss Lost again next week! 

The Stingray

At the back of our minds there lurks a shadow. As the gentle easterly breeze picks up, and our hair starts to wave around in it's new-found strength, the tension rises in our small camp. Off the end of the jetty, Max whips back his rod and throws his recently-caught trumpeter out with the breeze, willing it on past the flickering jetty lights at Point Walter and out into the dark abyss.

This story begins back in the final reaches of 2009, December, out the back of the E-sheds at the mouth of the Swan River. After a reasonable night of fishing, we begin to pack-it-in, when this guy, a fishing expert according to himself, hooks up. Earlier in the night, we saw this guy walking towards us with his huge beach rod, as long as a small car. We laughed at him, sarcastically asking him what kind of fish he is trying to get with that. So ensues a conversation which none of us want to get involved in - this guy tells us all his wonderfull stories about how his mate caught a starfish one time, and he started giving us fishing tips as if we had not lived on a tropical island surrounded by ocean all our lives. And he told of how, once, he caught a stingray.

So, we were about to head for home when this guy's rod starts bending wildly. But his rod tip doesn't flicker like when a fish is fighting for it's life is on the other end - it just bends, like a dead weight. Like a snag. The guy starts walking from side to side, pulling his rod along with him, trying to prove that he had another stingray on. Nobody believed him, and after he lost his second "stingray" in the space of 5 minutes, we left, laughing at him and his obscene stories all the way home.

The following fishing trip, Vince and I encounter a woman on the jetty at Point Walter. She has a massive rod, with little bells on the end - like the ones you find on a cats collar. Amused by the whole set up, we ask what kinds of fish she is after with that thing, what is she aiming to catch? "Anything", she replies. "I've caught stingray before". Me and Vince can't contain ourselves, it's just too funny. First, the crazy guy at the E-sheds, and now this crazy lady at Point Walter. Stingrays, yeah right!

But as we continue to fish the warm summer nights, we hear more and more stories of this elusive stingray. One night a guy walks down to the jetty with a bow and arrow. "What are you gunna catch with that, mate?"
"Stingray".
Another night, a woman walks over to inquire about our fish.
"Oh yeah, I got a couple of 40cm Tailor down at Rockingham the other night"
"What about Stingray?"
"Yeah, got some of 'em too"
The shadow starts to take shape in the back of our minds.

In time, Max starts bringing down his big rod and a couple of hefty gang-hooks. "what are you gunna get with that Max?", I cheekily remark.
"Stingray!" he says, now just the generic answer that question or any similar. But by the end of the night, we aren't laughing. Max's rod buzzes, and bends like the harbour bridge. The whole trumpeter on the end had just been smashed. After a few tense moments, he loses the fish. We all look at each other. The shadow that had been lurking ever since the crazy guy had talked about it at the E-sheds, had now suddenly had sprung out of the dark and become a certain reality.

Thus brings this story to the present. Max typically calls and swings by after work. We pop into the tackle store on Canning Highway, get our packets of white and blue bait and gang hooks and a couple of packs of glow sticks to go after some little tailor down in the river. But we also buy some bigger hooks, some thicker line and a big steel leader. We head across the road and get a hefty McDonalds dinner, and we fill the esky with ice and some Jack Daniels and Coke, and we rug up for a long night on the end of the jetty, braving the howling easterly coming down through the valley. As the night deepens, and the bigger tailor start to shy away, Max sets up his big hooks and baits up a whole fish. The shadow, still in the back of our minds, has now taken on its full form. An inquisitive man comes up to Max and I, and asks what we are trying to get with that kind of gear. Max and I look at each other, we aren't laughing anymore. "Stingray"

LA X

Unfortunately, every great story has to come to an end. In my opinion, Lost is one of the greatest stories ever told. And tonight, the final chapter of this great story begins. Another step closer to the end of an era.

For me, it is probably the bitterest, sweetest moment conceivable. Lost has been a significant part of my life for the best part of 6 years. It has helped me through some tough times, it gives me something to look forward to when things are difficult, and it has given me hours upon hours of pure enjoyment and happiness. The bitterness comes from the fact that in 18 episodes time, the final ever Lost will air, and then what will I have to look forward to?

The sweetness comes from the fact that I know, the final season will be truly awesome, powerful, epic. I know the writers will have many vicious curve-balls to throw at us fans, and many fearsome twists and turns and cliffhangers. And I can't wait to find out what happens to Jack and co. in the end! Boy this is going to be one hell of a rollercoaster ride! 

Tonight, in about an hour and 15 minutes, is the season premier, and I am already nervous. God knows how I will be feeling in the moments leading up to and after the final episode. I will most definitely be laughing, or crying. Most probably both! And I'm sure I will have to write to express my feelings at those moments too. But for now, it's just nerves. 

But I guess it's too late to go back now. I am committed, almost to the point of [beyond] reason, to this show. I have been for almost a third of my life. It's time to let destiny run it's course...

I'll see you at LAX!

The Uncomfortable Passing

So, I'm walking down the street to the traino and a girl, about my age, maybe a little older, maybe a little younger, approaches me traveling in the opposite direction. Nobody else is around, just her and me, headed for an awkward collision. My first reaction, after the initial realisation that there is no other option but to pass her, is to get my head down. Maybe I will be able to pass, by pretending I never saw her coming? No, that's certainly not going to work! What do I do? She's so close now. Ok Chris, come on, lift your eyes, say something as she passes. Acknowledge her. Smile. Walk on by. Ok, here she is, we look up, our eyes meet, she bows her head and walks past without even a nod of the head or a smile! Boy was that awkward! 

Why does this always happen when I pass someone my age? Is there some secret code which states that a young person should never acknowledge the passing by of another? When you pass an older person it's easy to look up and say "good morning" or an appropriate alternative for the current time of day. When you pass someone younger it hardly matters, they might give you an inquisitive smile or comment, and you the same. But when it comes to someone your age, it's always the "keep your head down until you pass awkwardly", and continue on to your respective destinations.

What is so hard about saying hello to your respective teenager? Why is it so difficult to spare a little smile as you wander by? Until I find a stranger that can acknowledge my passing, and I theirs, it will continue to remain a mystery...

Another Citi Moment of Success? Not quite...

After all my years of being an obsessed cricket tragic, I finally got to witness my first game of Twenty20 cricket. I left the ground disappointed.

Not because I am one of those sour pessimists that reckons Twenty20 will be the death of cricket. Ney, I do enjoy the shortest format of the game quite a lot, and I think it is indeed healthy for the game of cricket. But with all the hype, all the build up, I thought the whole experience would be an excitement juggernaught from start to finish. I was wrong.

Maybe I had too high expectations, watching so many games of IPL on TV, and hearing Channel 9's commentators drone on about how it's the "rock and roll" format of the game. I was expecting gorgeous, American Football cheerleaders dancing in skimpy outfits, and a dunking machine on the boundary, and a live DJ pumping the latest hip tunes. But alas! Sure, there were fireworks, and a miscellaneous skate park on the grass bank to provide some form of lunchtime entertainment (not that you had any time to look away). But it was little consolation. There were no cheerleaders, there was no dunking machine or DJ. Just the old WACA soundtrack all the way from the eighties.

It probably didn't help that the cricket was average. There were no big hundreds or sensational hatricks. No swashbuckling Shaun Marsh innings or epic Dwayne Bravo spells. There were barely any sixes hit throughout the night (although I couldn't help myself screaming " that's a DLF maximum!" after each one). Lee Furlong wasn't even down on the boundary doing interviews for Fox Sports. What a shame!

Also not adding much excitement was the crowd, who were reasonably quiet all night. The mexican wave somehow made it around the ground a few times (how it got through the members, I don't know). There was one beer snake down on the eastern side, which was quicky, to everyone's dismay, broken up by the security (or serpent wranglers). One beach ball got thrown around breifly, before it fell off the edge of the Inverarity Stand (too many boos), and one guy got escorted out of the ground by no less than 6 security guards and 2 police officers for sneaking in a bottle of vodka. That was it. I've seen rowdier at a Sheffield Shield game!

Oh well, at least there was plenty of time to relive our favourite KFC filler ads. HEY PUN-NA, WE'RE GETTING KAY-EFF-SEEEY!