Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER
I first met Thor at high school in year 8. I had moved into 8.1 on account of my mother who was a teacher at the school and thought that the group of misfits that formed 7.6, an whom I had gleefully befriended, were not going to be a lasting or successful influence for me. Thor stood out as ‘not from these parts’. He had a uniform that roughly approximated the one we all wore down to every article, but matched none, and it was clearly assembled from various hand me downs and op shop excursions. He also had a thick Southern American accent. In a town like Stawell, and he travelled to Stawell from a far smaller and remote town of Rupanyup, the American accent alone was a death sentence. The poverty was common to most of us but when combined with the accent there really was no escape.
I look back now quite proudly that I took to Thor with open eyes but in reality it probably wasn’t due to an advanced lack of prejudice but more a sense that he was a non threatening version of myself, slightly poorer, slightly more alienated, slightly less funny. Perhaps that’s a cruel thing to say. He is after all my best friend and a profound influence in so many ways. It’s hard to put your forty something brain back into the mind and body of a 13 year old. This feels like the end of that thread but it’s not really, in the 10 minute trial my lack of continuity is starting to show. The fear that without a structure I might lose my way and write shit? Perhaps that in itself is shit? I know how to get work done, I know that shit work leads to good work, you cant build the perfect temple in your mind, and we have just watched a video drilling down the same message. This really is an exercise in finding or testing what could happen in ten minutes…back to Thor.
I think of all of my childhood as perhaps the most perfect time. It could be described as a trial if you wished to do so but the truth is that it was perfect, and it launched me to early thirties, to job, to family. Its probably the family that causes you to question. The job can longer be the achievement by which you measure and tick off success. Somehow propelling the kids is not enough. It should be but how do you achieve a balance?
Back to the childhood. It was always defined by a side kick, a best mate, and they always changed. In order: Doug, Daniel, Ty (he runs through all as a background sub best mate), the 7.6 misfits, Thor, Brian, Scott, Ben, Brett, Thor, Stuart, Thor. It does always come back to Thor. I haven’t seen him now for two years. He has his own family and it seems awkward to force these two clans together so we can chew the fat. The reality is that there is currently no sidekick. Perhaps its Olly, but you can’t do that to your son, he needs a dad, not another mate. It’s not mutually exclusive but there is a difference. It’s all pretty reflective. Could you sit through a whole novel of me self reflecting? There would need to be some actual action, some character interaction and I’m not sure I could write that well. The issue is that the books I like best are fiction. Jasper Jones has lots of self reflection. Shipping News has none. It’s the events that tease out the thinking. The Beach? I’d need to read it again, try to work out why I loved it. The ten minutes is really starting to drag now. I am deeply suspicious that she has stopped the clock. Perhaps I should try some third person?
Ray sat in the writing class wondering exactly what he might get out of it. Being the only male was not particularly surprising in hindsight (perhaps a little in real time) but the mix of personalities was a pleasant surprise. Some of these people have been writing for years and there seem some genuinely recognisable stars. Its safe to say that Ray is the only one in the room who knows nothing about the host. Her enthusiastic and frequent embrace of the word cunt reminds him of an old house mate, Lucy, and more specifically her mother, both of whom were regular c bomb offenders. That house in Brunswick was a seminal chapter in Rays evolution. House mates he neither knew nor, for extended periods, liked, but grew to love.
Back to the third person.
The pen has created a red furrow in his index finger, plain evidence of a lack of recent pen form.
‘Does anybodies finger hurt?’
It got a laugh but the room was pretty focused. There was a collective determination, a bit like a marathon pack, right beside each other but at the same time completely in your own head.
Ray looked outside the window, a glance really, pausing now would feel like failure. Dev had given strict instruction that the pen could not stop. The leaves outside where practically glowing read and Rays mind drifted to what might otherwise be on this resplendent autumn afternoon. What would the kids be doing? No doubt Baba had arranged some kind of activities but the tone at drop off suggested there would be a fair bit of screen time too.
Some dialogue.
Ray arrived 15 minutes early. It had felt like a tight drop when he bustled the kids out the door and drop off at Babas had been nothing short of abrupt. Dump and run. The Saturday traffic had been kind though and he now found himself with ten minutes to wait. The venue was clearly closed with no prospect of opening ahead of time. Whoever was in there was pottering about in the same non attentive and dismissive manner as the kinder carers before the 8:30 door open. Whatever they were doing, it was going to take until exactly 10:00am, their walk to the door timed to hit the handle as the second hand struck twelve. There were two people outside…the clock stops. Its pens down.