Don't Make Me The One That You Left Behind

She was one of those rare special people who stuck to their word, even after I’d come unstuck with mine so many times. She even gave me a song that was all mine. She gave me a lot of songs actually, but this one really stuck. She was a wallflower, and that makes sense doesn’t it? Because I found her on a wall on a beautiful day where the clouds made ripples in the sky like the ocean. Some say that’s not possible, to compare the sky to the ocean, but I think it is, and this girl that I found on a wall, she thought so too.

When you look out to sea and all you see is ocean and sky you get this feeling that you are losing everything that’s been holding you back, you get this feeling that you can leave it behind because that line between the sky and the ocean, it becomes blurred. So much so that you begin to believe that there really could be ripples in the sky just like the ocean and maybe that’s all you need to believe.

I don’t believe it’s impossible, for two to merge into one, and for all that vastness what you get in return is clarity, and then finally, finally, you can let go. But like that blurred line, you realise that the girl you found on a wall, she’s fading away, and you can’t figure out if you should blame the ocean or the sky or maybe you should just blame yourself. Because all those rare special people only exist in the moments before a moment, everything after that is up to you. And if I were more grateful I’d say thank you, for letting me find this girl, for letting me have this one moment, but I can’t help but wonder where that girl has gone.

You are probably someone else’s girl now, and I know that you were never mine, but you took a chance on me and I let you down. You decided I wasn’t worth the risk and you know what, I’m not, but you should have never made me feel this way, because for as long as you’ve been gone, all I can do is look for you, or look for someone like you. And I don’t know what feeling is worse, knowing there is no one else like you, or not ever really knowing you at all.

We have this tendency to exaggerate until suddenly we believe the impossible, and I guess it was all the dreams about you, but you’ve become so exaggerated that I’ve begun to wonder if you were ever real. And that wall that I found you on has become the outline of my world, a wall that exists for as long as I let it, a wall that exists without you, and that seems more impossible to me than anything. That you, the girl, the rare special girl, the wallflower that I picked, that you are no longer on that wall and that wall continues to haunt me and I’ve chased that wall to the place where only the sky and the ocean lay, but you aren’t there. And all I can tell you now is that I no longer believe.

I had this thought, this crazy thought that you’d be back one day and you’d find the wall where I found you and you’d write to me. But I guess to you this feels like the right thing to do. But can I tell you that all I feel is sadness and disappointment. That you became one of those people who disappeared, and if it was just that, then I would have expected it, forgave it. But you told me you weren’t one of those people and it sounds so stupid now but there seemed to be so much honesty between us that I actually believed you.

Looking now at the empty wall the truth seems hard to find. What you did, what you are doing, it’s not helping, and I know you think it is. You think that I need time and space, but I’ve told you about all the things I don’t believe in and they made the list. Maybe I’m wrong and maybe I’ve been wrong all this time. Maybe you aren’t that rare special girl and what I never told you is that I never really wanted it to happen, and I know you said it never could, but I knew that and all I wanted was something to believe in again. And no, you know what, I’ve tried to live my life, to let it go and leave it, and that’s great advice coming from someone who’s already left. I’ve been living with this delusion that you’ll read my writings on the wall, that you’ll come back one day, that you might even write back to me, you might even consider that we could start again.

So here it is, I’m giving you my truths and right now to me they feel like the ripples in the sky, but you don’t look at the sky anymore do you?

Before You Take A Swing, I Wonder, What Are We Fighting For?

The streets feel so big when you are walking through the middle of them, not a car in sight, just people, people who all believe they are fighting for the same thing. I woke up this morning and asked myself what I was fighting for. Because today was Pride day in Brisbane and that was meant to mean something to me. So I put on my temporary rainbow tattoo and I held my girlfriend's hand and I decided to feel proud. But I still wasn't sure why I was meant to feel proud or what I was fighting for.

Last year was my first pride march and I remember feeling quite emotional, I was surely achieving some kind of milestone, a rite of passage, I don't know. This year wasn't the same, there were less people in the march and it was quieter, I admit I've never been one to cheer myself, too self conscious, but there wasn't the same buzz, the same spirit. I couldn't help but feel that the city could do a little more to support the event. Because it was an event, to a minority perhaps, and my guess is that if you asked the general majority of people if they knew what today was, they wouldn't know, and why would they? What does this day mean to other people?

So I asked myself again what I was fighting for, if we are fighting for equality, which is what I assume it is, then why is this day so exclusive? Why, when it's over do I feel a strange emptiness, a sadness to walk amongst the crowds again, because I'm no longer in a space where I feel accepted. As we marched, a bunch of onlooking teenagers were taking photos and shouting out 'faggots', laughing and running off, probably running home to post the pics on Facebook and have a laugh with their mates, because apparently being gay was funny. Why are we breeding ignorance and not acceptance?

I can only speak for myself and I can only say what this day means to me. Pride day to me is about fighting for the right to walk down the street holding my girlfriend's hand and to not feel like I'm on show in a museum. I'm fighting for the right to not be verbally abused in public by passersby whose only knowledge of lesbians is as porno turn-ons. I only came out less than three years ago and I can't even count the amount of times I've experienced homophobia. A mother pointing my girlfriend and I out to her children 'look kids, those are lesbians'. Last time I checked, 'lesbians' weren't a rare species, an exhibit in a museum, an attraction at the circus, but that's what I've been made to feel like, and I know I'm not alone in this.

This day means a lot to me and I show it by wearing my pride on my sleeve, something I wish I could do more often. At times I have succumbed to the pressure of hiding my sexuality for the sake of other's comfort, but no longer. If someone is going to stare at me for not looking how I'm 'supposed' to look, then I'm going to stare back at them and make them feel uncomfortable, make them feel wrong. Our gender shouldn't be defined by the clothes we wear and the haircuts we have, we love our stereotypes sure, but we need to leave these tired definitions behind if we are ever going to see change. I'm not going to try and define myself within a world that has already decided to define me, I'll find another way you can count on that.

The Night Is Yours Alone

Don't you remember back when we were young and our loves were young. When we had sleepovers and sang about everybody hurting. And now we are older and we've been hurt, some still hurting. We believe those words now, more than we believe in a love that lasts forever. And what I never told you was that when I sang those words I was that person hurting, and what you don't know now is that I'm still hurting, and the nights are mine alone.

What I'm telling you now is that I've had enough and I'm waiting for you to tell me it will be alright. But you won't tell me. You won't tell me anything. So I guess I'll just sing those words to myself now that we're older and now that we've realised love won't last forever.

I thought you believed in them too. I thought you were the one who would be there to tell me. But you are hurting in your own way now. I feel that if I knew you sooner, or if I knew you different, then this would all be okay and we could go back to our sleepovers and young loves and choose a different song to sing. But we can't, so we have to sing this song about everybody who hurts, but let's not make it a competition, I know all the hurt people and I've hurt enough to sing it straight.

I always begged for someone to sing this song with me, so we could hurt together, if only I knew you then, we could have sang it together. We could sing it straight because we both know what hurt is and we've hurt enough to keep singing that song until we no longer believe in anything but pain.

The Last Plane Out Of Sydney

I looked at my father and tried to find the parts of him that were like me. We had the same nose and the same sense of humour, but that's all I could find. He told me he was going away and that made me think of the times when I was younger when he would tell me he was moving to another city. He'd show me the city on a map, like knowing where he was going would somehow make it easier because there was only a ten centimetre line separating us.

I remember those times I'd try not to be emotional, because I never knew him anyway, so what difference did ten centimetres make? But then I'd go to bed and cry myself to sleep, because I didn't know him, and now I never would. He's only a few centimetres away now but I still cry when he says he's leaving because in twelve years, nothing has changed.

I have all these songs that make me think of him. Khe Sanh by Cold Chisel is my favourite. I was in the car with mum and dad one night when I was only young, but old enough to remember songs and we were driving him to the airport, mum was doing him a favour since he didn't have a car anymore. We were driving past the planes taking off and Khe Sanh was playing on the radio and I was in the backseat with tears in my eyes because the last plane out of Sydney was almost gone and my dad was getting on it.

So I look at my dad and wonder what it's like to be a dad, and if he ever wished he was like other dads, or maybe that I was like other daughters. Because I don't know anyone like us. Atleast I know there are two things that will always keep us together, our noses and our sense of humour.