the (tom)boy who could fly

remember that movie? you know the one from the 80s where the autistic boy eric is totally obsessed with flying? this one:



well i wanted to be him. i actually wanted to be the boy in every movie i saw when i was little…

kevin mcallister



bastian



david freeman



… you name it. but 'the boy who could fly' inspired me. so much so that i used to climb onto the roof of the house as a 7-year-old, edge my way along the tiles to the tallest point, and stand there with my arms outstretched like he does in the movie. the neighbours must have thought i was special… or actually, i think they were worried about the level of parental supervision at home.

i was too cluey to think that jumping off the roof with an umbrella would result in a soft landing. instead i’d focus all of my attention on my internal ability to just take off… yep, those were they days when i believed in mental telepathy and would stare at the toothbrush trying to make it move.

sadly, the closest i got to flying was in my dreams where if i sprinted fast enough i was able to take off and fly for about 30 meters. this didn’t work when i was awake. but i was a good sprinter as a result and cleaned up at school sport.

as a grown up my flying experiences haven’t been nearly as exciting. these days i fly quite a lot between syd and melbs for work, gigs and just catching up. i’ve had such a bad run with flights recently. two weeks ago i was stranded in melbs cos virgin blue had a computer meltdown and a bunch of flights got cancelled. the airport was like a disaster zone with sweaty, tired bodies sprawled out on the carpet looking miserable late on a sunday night… and the chirpy staff were trying to make up for it by handing out free krispy kreme doughnuts and cheese burgers (for kids only – which didn’t go down too well with some folks). you should have seen the stampede for free junk food. scary, scary shit.

to fill the time i pulled out my laptop and started watching that homoerotic spartan battle movie '300' which was the only thing i’d downloaded that i hadn’t watched yet.



because we were all sitting on top of each other i felt weird when the grunty sex scene came on with nannas and grandkids either side of me. awkward.

but it wasn’t all bad. i was put up at crown that night in a very flash hotel room and work flew me back first thing. fyi… i AM wearing undies in this pic:

and then more flight dramas this weekend care of tiger (i know, i know… it’s my own fault). the bastards called me an hour and a half before we were due to depart on friday afternoon to say my cunting flight had been cancelled (i paraphrase) with the next available one the following morning. roooaarrr.

and because everyone knows that melb is awesome on the weekend there were bugger all flights available on other airlines, and the ones that were, were like $400 one way. bollocks. so it meant i couldn’t perform my comedy act on 'fake lesbians' that night and had to make a zillion phone calls explaining what the shit had happened. grrr.

but not all my flying experiences have sucked. i used to get paid to think up tv shows and was flown to an international development conference every year to mingle with other creatives. no shit, that was my job. do you hate me?

anyways, one time i was on a flight to berlin with my development team and that sooky movie 'the notebook' was playing.



i hate this movie. i hate movies that go out of their way to make you cry. tragic dog movies are an exception, however.



just hearing that song makes me cry. such a good dog.

so 'the notebook' was playing and we were all watching it and i was getting annoyed. i looked to my left and noticed that one of my workmates was dabbing her cheeks with a tissue. to my right, my boss was tearing up. when i took my headphones off i could hear someone getting really choked up. i looked to the seat in front and my male colleague kristian was pretty much bawling – his face was bright red and his stripey shirt was wet all down the front.

at this point i started crying – crying with laughter. from a previous blog entry you will know that i cry when i laugh – i’m emotionally back to front – so my eyes starting pissing out salty water and the four of us were there crying hysterically over the bloody notebook. the other passengers must’ve thought we were on crack.

then my workmate went to fetch more tissues from her bag in the overhead locker and accidentally knocked some kid’s big plastic toy dinosaur, which then fell on another passenger’s head. that was it. we were gone. crying/screeching/snorting/choking uncontrollably.

i wish all flights were this good.

so in the words of the narrator from 'the boy who could fly':

“we’re all special. we’re all a little like eric. maybe we can’t soar up into the clouds. but somewhere deep inside… we can all fly.”

now sing along:

up in the air i fly

zoom, zoom, a-zoom a-zoom zoom

up in the big blue sky
zoom, zoom, a-zoom a-zoom zoom

zzzoooooom, zzzooooom,

zoom, zoom, a-zoom a-zoom zoom.

you feelin it?
(sub)urban tomboy x

i can tell that we are gonna be friends

i'm back. back with my first proper (sub)urban tomboy blog entry since forever ago. i really enjoy writing these and i'm sorry for making you wait so long for this instalment. i've been sharing quite a lot on twitter, fagbook, formspring (e.g. you ask me questions anonymously and i answer them)

 
and on hungry beast as you may be aware (man, the world has gotten a whole lot more chatty) but i'm excited to be back home where the air is sweet.

there's something beautiful about longer form storytelling and i have a belly full of (sub)urban tomboy wonder to share with you... raw, nostalgic, curious and contemplative... and just plain fun.

this entry is about friendship... i know i've been down this road before (remember the epic fight i had with my oldest besty, nit, when we were in grade 2) but this time, it's about what friendship means in an age where a new pal is just a click away.

i've had an epic long weekend here in sydneyland hanging with my lovely friiieeeends. i moved here a year ago to work on hungry beast and it's taken this long for me to really feel connected to this city. right now i'm a tad delirious as a few of us went out dancing last night at an anything-goes indie queer night on oxford st. for the first time in a long time... we danced til the sun came up. we danced like no-one was watching (while loving the very fact that they were)... we danced with the gayest of gay abandon... and we were there when the night club turned into a day club and the muscle-marys poured in from some other party with their hairless, rock hard, man-boobed chests. it was wild. it was just what i needed. and i probably won't do it again for another 5 or so years;)

as an only-child, friendships have always been super important to me and i have such an affection for the people i choose to spend my time with. especially face, as opposed to facebook, time.

and according to facebook i have 829 friends.

but in a sense, i guess they are friends... (even the weirdo hungry beast fan whose name is written in some kind of hieroglyphics font)... i mean, they're friends if you see friendship is a continuum of association... from besties to workmates to kids i went to school with to acquaintances to folks who simply like the cut of my jib and want to know me better... perhaps?

at risk of sounding like a friendship-floozy, i think this is ok. yeah, they're not all deep or profound friendships, but i get a kick out of people. i like knowing what folks are up to and i like folks caring about what i'm up to... i like this feeling of connection. it's primal and addictive.

not all my friends are 'keepers' though. this is my word for BFFs... but i do have more keepers now thanks to the sheer volume of friendships in real life and online and the fact that i've been collecting them for nearly 30 years. and my keepers i hold dear (that's one of my fave nan expressions)... along with what's his britches? which is how my nan ina refers to "friends" whose names she can't remember.

my keepers are good eggs. my keepers have a strength of character that guides them through the ups and downs. my keepers are flawed and wiser due to their mistakes. my keepers care about me and challenge me... and vice-versa. to cut through the wank, they're just fucking tops to be around. they're the folks who you don't have to see everyday, or every month or even every year, but when you connect it's like no time has passed.

i recently starting 'seeing' one of my keepers. okay okay... this is the other reason i'm writing a blog on friendship cos it's kinda topical in my world;) by seeing i mean we started hanging out frequently and it got intimate. she's someone i've known since i moved to sydney who i've always clicked with and thought was pretty rad. we're similar in a lot of ways so the interest (for me, anyway) was both effortless and well, a bit narcissistic.

soooo after breaking up with my gf of two years (due to the struggles of long distance and some communication issues - if i was to sum it up in a tweet), this friend was the first person i'd found myself drawn to, and i guess, let my guard down with. for this freshly single (sub)urban tomboy, the feeling was kinda like the irrational belly vibes i felt for my hot chem teacher in year 10 that saw me become a straight A+ scientific whiz kid until we got a different teacher the following year and i lost interest in balancing chemical equations. (just on that, how is it that i didn't understand what these homo vibes were until 5 years later? i digress).

yeah, so i guess i was seeing my rad friend and it was cruisy. until it got to that point where you ask yourself what is happening here? are we friends who make out on the weekend? friends with benefits? ummm? people are emos... and i know i can't keep seeing someone consistently without becoming emotionally attached so the road generally forks into three paths... relationSHIP, friendSHIP or the rough seas of ambiguity where no-one's sure what's going on and there's a good chance of at least one sailor drowning! so we needed to address it. and we did. and we decided that friendship was the way to go.

so i'm not gonna lie and say i don't feel any of those chem teacher vibes, but when you're about 7 weeks out of a pretty big relationship and trying to get yourself sorted, the option of having someone you think is rock solid in your corner as a FRIEND, is a good one.

here's a song while you think about that:

we're going to be friends by the white stripes




not everyone is a keeper, and sometimes friendships are too important to risk. and anyways, there's always those 828 other folks to knock around with.

i couldn't write a blog on friendship without posting one of my fave songs of all time:

my pal by god



oh and finally, here's a song i really hate... but when performed by 'kids incorporated' is kinda amazing:)



thanks for getting this far and welcome back to my adventures,
(sub)urban tomboy xx

I was eaten by a HUNGRY BEAST!

Guys,

It's been a long time between drinks I know. Very sorry. I've been kidnapped by a new TV show called Hungry Beast on the ABC - 9pm each Wednesday!

You can now find me here:

http://hungrybeast.abc.net.au/users/mschafter

Make sure you watch the show and follow the website for stacks of new stories and adventures.

Spit handshake,
(sub)urban tomboy

i went to the JOHNNY YOUNG TALENT SCHOOL!

when i was about 7-years-old i got sent to the johnny young talent school. this doesn't mean i was on the tv show... although all the kids who went to the school had that little carrot dangled in front of their noses so the stage mums and dads kept forking out the cash for weekly singing and dancing lessons.

instead we got to sing at MOOMBA and do annual concerts at DALLAS BROOKS HALL which scarred me for life. i'll come back to this in a sec.

each class was divided into two parts. first was the singing. here the teacher hit notes on an electric keyboard and we got to sing them back at her. now don't get me wrong... i loved to sing. i still do. and i can still remember the words to nearly all the songs we learnt... like this one:



and even this
(unfortunately we didn't get to do guns'n'roses):



but i hated the dancing... which was the second part of the lesson. i just felt un-co. and for a kid who lived in dirt covered tracksuits and bubblegummers i hated having to wear a leotard. and i didn't like the other girls at the school who were bossy cos their mums had told them they were gonna be famous... even though my mum liked to tell me that i was gonna be famous... when really, if anyone was gonna be famous it'd be her:



johnny young was every sunday in richmond. and on weekends i liked to play with my cousins down blackburn creek exploring storm water drains and making rope swings. so i resented having to leave the creek early to get back in time for johnny young.

occasionally we were paid a visit by johnny himself... or some of the kids from the tv show. this was special and i liked it. johnny never touched any of us up in case you were wondering. well not that i know of anyways.



i went to johnny young for about 4-5 years. i'd had a gut full of it by grade 5 and decided to play basketball instead which didn't involve sequins.

ah yeah... the scarring. as i mentioned, each year we had a major concert where you could invite anyone who cared. sooo mums, dads and grandparents... and my auntie 'nin' liked to come too. for these occasions we'd learn a big group number and dress up in special coloured leotards with extra sequins and tassels. the singing was pre-recorded at a studio and we'd mime to ourselves while galavanting across the stage.



we were also encouraged to wear make up because our faces would be washed out by the lights... and this was my mum's favourite part... because it meant she got to spend ages colouring in my face with eyeliner, eye shadow, lip stick and blusher transforming me into a star. unfortunately, compared to the other kids... this (sub)urban tomboy ended up looking like a clown... or more accurately, like someone had punched me in the eyes. and the other girly girls used to tell me i had too much make up on which made me feel even more retarded.



i'm the freak standing up on the far right.

here you go... you can see better now:



i come from a loving, supportive, yet eccentric family, but i do believe this is child abuse.

snot blocks and old ladies with whiskery chins

i went to a funeral today. i cried. like you’re supposed to… allowed to... like you do. sometimes i forget what crying feels like but times like these remind me that i’m not a cyborg like the t-1000.

actually i take that back. i do cry a lot. but only when i laugh. when i laugh my eyes piss out water. so much so that the front of my t-shirt gets wet. it’s like i got wired back to front when they built me.

i didn’t really know the old lady who died. it was my nanna ina’s 92 year-old sister, jessie, who i’ve only met about 4 times. but i cried for my nan. i cried cos nan is one of 5 sisters and jessie was the first of them to go. nan is in her 80s and now lives in a nursing home. while she’s still all smiles she’s quickly fading and i’m missing her already.

the morning was beautiful. the funeral was very typical. there were prayers and stuff which didn’t mean anything… and they kept making everyone stand up for these bits which wasn’t fun for my nan and her sisters with their walking frames.

but the photo montage of nan and her sisters growing up… looking pretty and happy and lively and cheeky made me cry… sad and happy tears. happy for the silly times that mean so much… and sad that time is running out for this gang of 5 golden girls from the western suburbs. sad that occasions like these have become the only times they all get to see each other.

i sat behind nan... watching her shake from parkinsons. watching her share crumpled tissues with her sister nancy. watching her embroidered jacket that my auntie dressed her in for the occasion. watching her slowly turn to her sisters when a particular photo brought back a good memory.

i sat next to dad. he knew the words to some of the prayers off by heart which surprised me. must have been the sunday school he got sent to when he was little… which the rest of my uncles wagged (dad was the good kid). and a few of my uncles sat to dad’s right in their jeans and polar fleece tracksuit tops. and when nat king cole’s ‘unforgettable’ played their eyes welled up.



after the service we all went to jessie’s daughter’s house around the corner for morning tea… an elaborate spread of home made snot blocks (vanilla slices if you're uncouth) and curried egg sandwiches and bottomless cups of tea.

i found nan in the sun room with all the other old ladies. i told her about work (cos she likes to know what’s coming up on neighbours) and she squinted at me cos the sun was too bright.

it was here that i met my new friend, mrs charles.

sitting directly opposite nan, mrs charles had long whiskers and hardly any teeth. i said hello and she smiled brightly and said ‘who are you?’ spitting chunks of cake through the gaps in her teeth. i explained that i was ina’s granddaughter and she said she was mrs charles. she’d nearly finished her cake so i asked her if she’d like some more. she thrust her ear in my direction and told me she was deaf so i bent down closer and repeated my offer. she said ‘yes please… but not one of the gooey ones’ so i went to the kitchen and chose 4 cakes for her to choose from… brushing the cake off my face once i was out of the sun room.

she was happy with the cakes i brought back and insisted that i help her eat them… but i was already full and said they were to share with the other ladies. but i don’t think this got through as she ended up eating them all herself.

she asked again who i was and what i did, smiled widely, and said sorry for spitting cake on me again. then she pulled a tissue out of her sleeve to wipe my face. she had a good wipe and finally stopped when she realised my piercing wasn’t another crumb.

i said goodbye to nan and the ladies and left them with their cakes. i had to get back to work to get more neighbours goss for nan. unfortunately this didn’t impress mrs charles. she preferred home and away.

mons'n'roses

i've loved guns'n'roses ever since i was a little kid. i love the music. i love the band. and i love the man... AXL ROSE. so... he might be an egotistical wanker but my love for him is unconditional. the aiyeeyaiyeeeyaiii voice... the bandanna and bike shorts... the distinctive swaying moves... for me, he's the ultimate rock star.

my love for this band peaked in 1991 when the gunners' track YOU COULD BE MINE featured in TERMINATOR 2 JUDGMENT DAY.



those of you familiar with my blog will already know how important this film and arnold schwarzenegger were to me back then. i wanted to be a motorbike riding cyborg like arnie and i wanted to save the future. and the fact that the gunners' music video featured footage from the movie almost made me wet myself every time it came on rage. even though i don't believe in heaven... i reckon it'd have to be as cool as this:



which is why, as an 11-year-old tomboy, i was inspired to recreate the magic that is YOU COULD BE MINE by G'N'R'S at somers caravan park over the christmas holidays:



since then, my love for axl has not subsided. i even entered a drag king competition a few years ago and performed a cave man act to WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE... cutting up my great grandma's fur coat in the process to make a loin cloth.

i didn't win. it was more like weirdo tarzan performance art than a drag act and alienated the lesbians who wanted to see dildo-wearing, moustached dykes miming to emo tunes. but i belted my chest and ate bananas on stage.

and then, last year, axl toured under the name GUNS'N'ROSES even though it was him and a bunch of session musos playing old gunners tracks (cos none of the original band members like him these days). but i fuckin loved it.

my mate sparrow and i dressed up as flannel x acid wash clad cock-rockin bogans and got a spot right up the front... with all the other flannel x acid wash clad cock-rockin bogans who didn't seem to have the same sense of irony as us... but i'm from wantirna so can't really talk.

and we got crushed and had beer tipped on us and it was like being in heaven... if only arnie was there... but these days he's busy saving the future of california or something...

G.A.N.G.

ever been in a gang? when i was little i was always in a gang. my friendship groups became gangs... and the name of the gang was generally a weirdo word made up of the first letters of our names... like J.J.A.M. now that's the shit.

and our gangs always had a base. in primary school our base was the SNOT SHIP... a wooden construction in the playground that we baggsed as our own and the other kids knew not to sit there or there'd be trouble.

my cousins and i were also a gang. a gang of little shits who used to steal kids balls and play 'keepings off' just for the fun of it. yup. we ruled the blacky south primary school oval on weekends... riding mini motorbikes full speed across the footy field and crashing into the metal fence cos we'd lose control showing off to the other kids... and then uncle terry would give us a hiding for being dickheads. suburban justice.

i'm now heading towards my late twenties and find myself about as happy as i was when i was 8 years old. which was a bloody sweet time. at my current age, i feel very similar to who i was when i was a little kid. i play, i take risks and i have a confidence in my gut that only kids have because they just do what feels right regardless of what anyone else thinks. i am once again a little shit. if only i knew i had it right back then.

my teens were spent wondering why it wasn't cool to play 40 / 40 at lunch time and trying to get used to the social ritual of kissing someone you didn't care too much about when you greeted them. and my early 20s were spent trying to be impressive. yawn.

but now... nearly 20 (post-little-shit) years later i have a GANG again and it's cowabunga cool. we're mainly a bunch of tomboys who like to ride bikes on the weekend, crash on each other's couches, dress up for parties like TUFF MUFF, punch each other (tough love) and just hang out. we've got each other's backs and there's a code of respect that just happened by itself. we talk about girls and try to figure them out... and when it all gets too much we kick the footy or go shopping for flannies. ok we're not THAT brain dead. tix moisturises and skillz knows how to screen print and sew. impressive on both fronts. and wheels knows more about history than my nanna. and i can.... ummmm... do stuff too.

the other saturday we went shopping for military gear for the tuff muff 'women in uniform' party. we met at aussie disposals around lunchtime and spent about an hour trying on camo gear and parading around the store like a bunch of excited lezzers.... for us, this was the equivalent of shopping for the school formal dress.

after purchasing our gear we walked back to my car to inspect my back tyre which i had a feeling might have been flat... well it looked pretty flat when tix and i got out of the car before going shopping. sure enough it was flat. THIS WAS A CHALLENGE FOR GANG.

skillz took the lead having a changed a few tyres in her time... whipping off my hubcaps (that sounds dirty but isn't) and getting the bald spare tyre out of my boot. wheels got her camera out and took pictures of the action. tix was the foreman and gave direction... and i was employed to unscrew the nuts which took brute strength (which is my skill apparently).



the following weekend we went to tuff muff. after having an awesome gang roast dinner at tix's place (where i was taught how to roast) the four of us got on the tram and headed to collingwood. cars tooted at us and people stared... and it was awesome... strength in numbers (especially with gay epilates on our shoulders...) lucky we weren't travelling to frankston. as soon as we got off the tram a bunch of drunk (i think) gay-lady-folk rushed at us like groupies and touched our outfits. they even tracked us down later that night. shit hey.

and best of all... (well there were better moments in the evening... for me this was pashing bob the builder at the request of some random punter in the toilet queue who wanted to take a picture of us)... we won the costume comp.

GANGS RULE x