Mornings After

Millennia ago I was cox of an VIII that swept all before it (occasionally literally, thanks to my "get out of my way or die" attitude). At the end of the season we won the national championships, pocketed the Maadi Cup (half the crew, with another cox, pocketed the Springbok Shield, too, a rare double), and lapsed into oblivion. There was, perhaps fortunately, no opportunity for wild parties, for the race was won on our home course, our school operated a strict curfew, and we were in bed, nearly sober, by 10.00 p.m.

I was an atheist at the time. The next morning the universe was an empty, cold place. My coxing career had lasted five seasons, and was over. Over on a high note, but over. I had returned for a fifth year of high school only to cox: I had done so, and it was done. Finished. Over. Seven more months of meaningless existence at school, perhaps, for all I knew, seven more decades of meaningless existence on the surface of an irrelevant globe floating around a meaningless sun in a meaningless galaxy in a near-empty sea of nothingness: it wasn't a cheerful morning. Even without a hangover.

Gradually I dragged myself into some sort of being. Ennui ruled, but the alternatives, thank the non-existent god, were less attractive. I stumbled on, setting myself the modest goal of becoming the first 1st VIII cox, at least in my memory, to become a school prefect. I failed. I failed too, therefore, to become the first cox to become a prefect to become James K. Baxter or T.S. Eliot. Oh well.

More than three decades later it doesn't matter terribly much. Endings of eras are less interesting, solipsism less of a key by which to interpret the universe. Yesterday, after a journey of more than ten years, I finally received notification that I have been awarded a PhD. There was no curfew in operation, but I couldn't be bothered partying. I watered my garden (a rare event), mused that I would like to send a hug to the Creator and Sustainer of life, energy and nonchalant thesis writers, and drove to an appointment two or three hours away.

The universe remained unshaken, but on the other hand it seemed a whole lot more full of meaning and purpose than it had 32 years before. Tomorrow would be another day, full of the same meaning and purpose as yesterday. Maybe it's middle age (late middle age, according to the Seven Ages of Man), or maybe it's the faith that snuck up on me a few years after I pocketed my share of the Maadi Cup, but it all seemed rather routine.

A nice moment in a routine, though, for sure. Doctor Godfrey: it has a satisfying ring to it. I shall water my garden with new panache, I'm sure.

Dose Blues

There's nothing like a cold to whisper intimations of mortality. Call me a hypochondriac for sure, but at times like these a black hole swallowing solar systems, galaxies and bloody useless viruses seems a real winning idea. Does the promised new heavens and new earth and restoration of all things so beloved of biblical authors and Jürgen Moltmann include the resurrection of these bloody little things that crawl into unsuspecting available orifices and imbalance human existence?

Okay, so there's always someone worse off. Yeah right. So I care? Through a fog of schnozz and pressure on my eyeball that makes me feel like Mad-Eyed Moodie with a hangover I wonder if I really want to know. I bet Picasso really had a cold when he vomited Guernica onto canvas - it has nothing to do with Hiroshima. Or whatever.

So I think I should go out and blow up the universe, or something. But I haven't got the energy.

Blimey. Here's hoping The Creator never gets a cold.

Someone pour me a whisky.

Blogger's Block

Eight days after my intial blogging adventure, and it's taken me this long not only to find time, but to find a way back to this exercise in meaninglessness. Or perhaps it was writer's block? God knows I have enough of that in other aspects of my life: the thesis that sits on my hard drive, yawning contemptuously at me, or the various bits and pieces that I should be doing for my day job.

Perhaps one day I'll say something interesting here. In the meantime I'll wonder why I would want to create an interior monologue and hang it out in the ether to dry.

Speaking of drying: having moved from (semi-)outback Queensland to Aotearoa New Zealand at the beginning of this year I still can't get used to the rain. It's been about ten days - until last night - since it rained here, and the locals are saying 'oooh, we need rain.' I saw more rain last night that I saw in ten months in my last earth-space. It's raining now. I could write purple prose about it and call it Rain Falling on Cedars.

If I'm blogging about the weather I must be boring. I'm a boring person. Welcome to the human race.

Ooopsies and Geneses

Ooopsie. Never in my life did I intend to start a blog. I wrote a diary for years, (and that was disastrous when it fell into the wrong hands) but thought this whole blogging business was too pretentious for words. Pretentious? Moi? But then I accidentally pushed a whole heap of buttons when I was trying to comment on someone else's blog and ended up with this, my very own shiny new one. So maybe I will air the inner meanderings of my vacuous mind in the ether after all.

I wonder if I'll ever find my way back here. Hmmmm. Now there's a thought. Ah well ... like a message in a bottle, off you go into the ether, vacuous meanderings ...