The Mirror

The thing that concerns me the most about living in a bureaucracy is that you could very well end up where you don't want to. Often in a bureaucracy there are forms to fill in. While at first these forms appear to have a variety of boxes to tick giving us what appears to be innumerable choices on closer inspection, (or in the event you actually fill in of these forms) you realise that you don't really fit into the descriptions provided. There's not actually that much choice. No big deal. No big deal until you wind up dead that is. Then it is a big deal. Obviously not to you, but to everyone else. Hopefully.

I get nervous filling out organ donor information when reapplying for my driver's license. As a diabetic I kind of wonder who the hell would want my organs anyway. It’s not like there’s anything wrong with them. Not that I’m aware of. But I could imagine that’s there’s a little bit more wear and tear on them. Perhaps it’s not even that, maybe it’s the thought that the recipient would be told, “By the way your heart belonged to a diabetic.”

“A diabetic? So… why do I get the heart of the diabetic… like they can’t even get life insurance… why would anyone want their heart?”

“Look do you want the heart or not… it’s got 10 maybe 20 good years left in it… how much did your heart have left? A week, week an a half?”

“I guess… I just… I just hoped I’d get like, you know an athlete’s heart, someone young, strong, and possibly black… you know?”

“Oh this guy wasn’t black… nope, nothin’ even close. Wasn’t tall either. Nope. School teacher. Sorry buddy it’s that or the 75 year old that kicked it at the picnic.”

I have this fear of letting down complete strangers as well. I don't want to meet the eyes of the lady behind the counter as I hand the completed form to her. Like, I don’t want to be sexist but in my mind it's a woman - a biggish middle aged woman with no sense of humour who mentions that I've checked the bit that says I'm not handing over my organs upon death. She keeps staring. Even when I look away, I can feel her eyes on me. Even in my imagination she’s staring at me and if you look closely (even though I’m not looking at her I can because it’s my imagination – actually if it was my imagination I’d have adimantium claws and a light sabre) you can see her eye lid twitch. Either way I apologise and hastily correct the information.

I don't want to feel bad.

I don't want to explain that I'm diabetic.

And most importantly, I don't want to face the poster that says, "Don't take your organs to heaven, heaven knows we need them here." Apart from the unlikelihood that we are actually going to take ourselves off to heaven in our present form and God is going to receive us only to turn us around and say,

"Hold on a minute tiger. No kidneys... you have no kidneys... were you aware that... you know this is happening more and more what's going on? Why is everyone giving them away. You need them here. Did you know you need them here?" He pauses, maybe for a minute, maybe for an eternity, thing is you're in Heaven. Finally He says, "And it's not just the kidneys, you name it, livers, hearts, eyes, brains... people are turning up without brains. Try playing chess sans a brain." At this points God sighs and folds His arms with a faraway look in His eyes. " This wasn't happening 50 years ago. Now you people turn up like sock puppets..." He trailed away,"...sock puppets."

So now I'm worried that upon an accident I might look dead, a brief discussion ensues amongst rescue workers and out comes the esky and Stanley trimmers.

That's not really what I'm talking about though. I'm talking about online tax returns that you simply haven't really got any idea whether or not you've provided the right information and then upon pressing return your house gets repossessed for tax fraud.

Well, the reason I'm bringing all this up is because of that particular feeling being invoked when I responded to an email. It read, simply Fred (not Sarah's real name) wants you to join Facebook. Should be called My Face. (Big shout out to Katie)
Well, that's nice, I thought. I'll join. I'll join and say hello. How nice.
Next thing I had a Facebook and I was contacting all my friends telling THEM to join. I didn't recall deciding to do that today. It wasn't even at the back of my mind. THEN I had one friend write back and say I needed to spice up my Facebook. So I urinated on my laptop and yelled "Is that enough salt for you? IS IT?" But I'm not sure if salt is a spice.

So now I'm part of something I can't abide.

Myspace tried to lure me in with their cheap tricks. Tom and some other guy. Wish I could remember his name. I've had him two if not three times try to get me to join. When I first got the email I was genuinely touched. Wow... someone wants to be my friend. Well, I will be their friend. And we will be friends. So I clicked on the link. And there he was, all by himself. That's about when my alarm bells went off. Why was a good looking guy like that all by himself. Someone I've never even heard of is smiling back from his desk where he is writing on his laptop, presumably to me. Suddenly I was a budgie in a cage staring into the mirror. And for a second I bought it. For a second I thought I had a friend. So I emailed him and told him that I wasn't going to be his friend. In fact, I had chosen to be his enemy. I was going to have my picture posted not under friend, but enemy. Sworn enemy. Come knocking on my cage, will you?. My diabetic cage of vengeance and… vengenceness.

Oh, and this is just for nerds only.

And Patrick needs thanking for putting me onto this one. Magic.

My Son the Bat.

Everyone wants their kids to be special. Special in a way that leaves the other kids in the dust. Not that we'd say that out loud of course but we want the rush of watching our kid finish the race first, or write something in class (or anywhere apart from a wall for that matter), that leaves us beaming with pride. We do not want our children to be special in the other sense of the word. The kind of special that makes us aware that other parents glance sidewards at us.

Recently we got Zac's report home from his pre-primary class. He's five.



















It's possibly a little hard to read, double click on it and you can read it for yourself. If you can't be bothered it essentially breaks down as such:

Creates a recognizable person: partially achieved

Includes a body, head arms, legs and facial features in their picture: partially achieved

Adds extra features to their portrait: Not yet evident

Uses a variety of colours in their portrait to distinguish features: Not yet evident.

So what precisely did my son draw when he was asked to create a self portrait?









Teacher's comment: Zac has drawn himself as a bat with his eyes closed.

Teacher is fairly certain Zac is autistic.

We suspect he is anti authoritarian.

Draw a picture of myself?! Noooooooo.... that's boring. No we really need a picture of a bat with his eyes closed.

I asked Zac why the bat's eyes were closed. Zac looked at me as if I was insane. "Because the sun is up."

I thought that showed some sort of intelligence. Bet the other kids didn't draw their self portrait depicting themselves with their eyes closed.

And hello to Emma who must start her own blog and Max who must also bite the bullet and start her own blog.... way to cool for anonymity these two. And they sell wine and are forced to listen to diabolically bad music. Cept Sting... I'm exempting Sting from that. And maybe a tiny bit of Wendy Matthews. But I can say that cause I love Arcade Fire and Modest Mouse and that balances out the uncoolness. Cept Sting is cool. Love Sting.

Oh, and by the way... there is something wrong with our new dog. His mouth is too big.