I am on a brief sojourn.  Four days at the beach with Mlle. F. and Mlle. M., whom, since time appears to be ignoring linearity, are 4y 9m and 2y 8m respectively.  The kids are important, evidently, as are their ages.

We’re at Whangamata, a place I’ve been coming for 30 years.  A place where out of the peak season (i.e., now) you can weave all over the road on your bicycle with impunity, as long as it’s back road.  Not because you’re an arse, but because you’re 4.  Or because you’re 38 with a 2 year old on your parcel rack who likes to look around.  Whangamata is a place where you can wear whatever you like, pop into an astonishingly good cafe and feel at home, and feel miles and miles from home…  Aided entirely by that photo in the photo below.

That is the work of Barend Beukes.  Photographer, chef, surfer, vinyl collector, lovely human.  I hope the outstretched arm of lady diner handing paper to gentleman diner gives you idea of the scale of the print, it’s big.  And sitting with  my girls today sipping fluffies and nomming scone, we all took some time to take it in.  I can’t tell you much more about it, but I can tell you the effect it had: As we left, I found myself looking to make sure my camera was safely nestled in a bag or something, I wasn’t carrying one.

We carried on, via bikes, Whangamata still being the kind of place where we could cruise down the main street, languidly.  Stopping to buy me new jandals and jumper.  Stopping to chat to Aunty Susan who we bumped into on the footpath.

The day carried on much like that…  Five books with Mlle. M. while her elder sister caught a nap.  And then a very poor fishing trip to the wharf, it was blustery and lumpy, I missed the tide and it was just all-round shit.  But still, we had a wharf to ourselves, and when Mlle. F. wasn’t looking I tugged her line and there was some excitement for the day.

We latterly decided to go to the estuary and found a sheltered nook where we swam, rolled around in the sand, collected treasure, spoke to snails, spooked flounder, quizzled at seagulls doing the stamp-stamp-wiggle-wiggle-shimmy-shimmy-peck-poke-eat dance.  Time (still doing that thing it’s been doing) snuck past me and it was supper o'clock.  So we retreated to the ute, brushed practical sand away, donned jumpers and ordered fish and chips from Estuary Takeaways and Store, slurping chocolate milk while we waited for our order to cook.

Finally retiring to Dad’s place, where we’re staying, we were a composition roughly 60% chips, 15% tomato sauce, 15% sand, 5% snot and 5% salt.  A long outdoor shower in the heart-shaped-clamshell-paddling-pool, jammies, stories, snuggles and bed.

I’m detailing this day to get to my point.  When the girls were tucked in, wetsuits washed, car and bach tidied, I grabbed a shower too.  And since the weather has finally dropped from 30ºc days and 25ºc nights… I took the opportunity of 16ºc to slide into the jumper we bought me earlier in the day.  The I stopped, and sent a selfie to Mme. L.

Mme. L., who is abroad attending Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, immediately confirmed “it’s a motorcycle jumper?”, and earned her and her badgers 100 points.  And this is where it turns to me.  I’ve been a pretty good Dad today.  When I’ve been too grumpy, I’ve noticed and corrected.  When I’ve been too lax, no-one’s been lost.  I’ve sort of managed to be in a flow, that’s worked today.  When Mme. L. is away I bolt here to be surrounded by Dad (Grandy), his indefatigable wife (Grandma Chris), my sister (Aunty Amy), because I can be a bit of shambles solo.  But time ameliorates many things… and it appears that 4.75 years of hashtag-dad-life on, I’m kind of nearly there.  I’m pretty chuffed really.  It’s nice to pass the experiences of my summers 30 years ago on to my own kin, with just enough “you’ve got this”, “OI!”, and “oh you poor thing”, mixed in.

Went for a walk with a mate.

Talked about how Mlle. F. was enrolled for primary school. Time flies.

Did some yoga.

Lit a candle.

Sitting on this couch with a cup of tea and a hefty tome.

Nice to be home.

(Left to right: 175mm wrench with inspection cap tool and bottle opener, vice grips and 9/16 UNF socket, 5/16 Whitworth ring and open end spanner, narrow flat head screwdriver  3/16th hex allen key)

What are the chances that the fork end caps fall off and the front wheel goes with them and I fall to my death face ground off on tarseal?  Fork end caps: Five-sixteenth Whitworth.

How are the odds on my handlebars rotating away from me loose in their stays throttle winding open and the brake and clutch beyond my grasp? Handlebar stays: Five-sixteenth Whitworth.

If the carb is cranked on too tight the throttle slide might stick wide-open, sickening visions of fumbling for the key as bottom ends suck white metal out of a bearing and start flailing any second they’ll be a leg-out-of-bed…  Carb manifold nuts: Five-sixteenth Whitworth.

There’s an odd tension in riding a motorcycle that was built 61 years ago, and has been fettled and fiddled constantly since.  It’s a constant holding of “what if” and “beautiful, she’s running nice today!”  I’ve had the Speed Twin for 76 days, rebuilt the clutch four times chasing slip; crashed it once - necessitating a new headlight, shell, speedo bracket; had the front wheel out once; pulled the carb apart twice; chased dodgy cables; and tightened the headstock thrice.  I’m getting to know her.  She’s wet sumped me once with half-a-litre spewing from the crankcase vent, but otherwise been a gem.

Tonight was 60 kilometres at dusk, up the hill, round the hill, down the hill, to the lake, back through town (just for window reflections) and does the new headlight work?

We’re bedding in, learning our ways.

I bet you’ve got a million poems written about you

With your sweet song of love, sky dance and set hearts a flutter, flutter.
But I’m not here to be flippant or fawning
You make me be here. You make me be aware.

You see from that vantage of a trilling speck on blue
That all of I have built citadel, cities, and sent yonder, yonder.
[shutting houses shutting souls]
Unable to be in the time and place.

And like mine, yours came from the old country, peak R. Victoria
Yours, mine, making shallow nests in this land.

“Tamahine! Quick, come!  Can you hear the Skylark?”  I call in glee.
“Look, all the way up there, can you see?”

Craned, cocked, in wonder or amusement
We stand, hands in hands
We see, from our vantage of a P. Radiata deck, you
We make you real. We see you up there.

Imbuing appreciation of what is not indoors
With your whistles of that voice same as circa eighteen sixty
Constant not flighty
Build, breed, brood, bird, Brother.

It was either: sitting in a hotel room in Wellington over a six-pack of craft beers; or in a bar in Melbourne trying to be cool; or at Seashore Cabaret between mouthfuls of burger nite… it doesn’t really matter, because memories can’t be trusted anyway.  But I want to believe that it was definitely Ben, and that the conversation had turned to forgotten arts.  Ben has kids, I have kids, his are older than mine, he’s farther down the path than me.  I accept his wisdom.  Ben was a guitarist in a band, he’s from South Australia, but moved to Melbourne to make it.  He gave up smoking.  Got a job in his brother’s technology company.  Has a house, a good-lady-Doctor-wife, and kids.  The guitars went into the attic.  About five years passed and Ben felt different.  So he climbed into the attic, got down a dusty guitar case and started noodling, like something was awake.  That’s how I want to remember Ben telling it.

I seek succour from from his tale.  When I see the dusty box of cameras in the spare bedroom wardrobe, or something seemingly innocuous sets off a sear of guilt.
“It’s ok, Ben, though”.
Tramping boots used only for gardening, lawns, brush-cutting.  Relegated from a life of wayfaring.
“What about Ben, though”.
Unfinished poem - Skylark: ‘You see from that vantage of a trilling speck on blue’.
“Ben was like, in a real band, though”.
A fitful sleep, dreamscapes of Northern Ireland explored on 50 year old pushbike - surely I’ve never been fitter, but now I’m aching, tossing in my sleep from an exhibition run on the kids’ slip and slide.
“Ben… though”.

Seize

There is a lagoon sapphire, transparent. Crystalline minerals sparkle in suspension. A ribbon of chilled air rises from the tension.

A wisp of vesper kisses leaves. Broad, glossy, emerald they turn to the caress of the breeze.

Heavy dew forms pear shaped, running through cumulus pulled to condense on tourmaline glass.

At the threshold beyond the reef the ocean fuses to sky, carrying gaze through spectrum to space.

Inestimable, source of blushed skin, glows back from jewels encrusted under and on.

Stand.

Step.

Feel the quartz fall

Step.

Stand.

Feel the wind at your nape

Step.

Fall, you are lagoon.

I have a history of falling in love with words from languages other than my native english tongue.  I’ve gone and done it again: Whakamā.  I was introduced to this word in stunning piece of writing with such a clear voice from Tayi Tibble - in Ihumātao: Everyone was there, e hoa she writes:

“Whakamā is an emotion that doesn’t have an exact English translation, but it is similar to feelings of inferiority, self-doubt and self-abasement. It’s a deep and enduring shame that is connected to dislocation, of not having a Tūrangawaewae, a place to stand, a sure-footing in te ao Māori . “

…of not having a place to stand.

There’s a few strings of this sentiment that I am observing.  Mme. L. has been watching something on Netflix that uses the Head and The Heart’s lyric from Down in the Valley, and has reignited a particular ache when I hear it: “I wish I was a slave to an age-old trade”.

“I’m hoping for a grand epiphany … I’m stuck, but it’s something I will feel in my guts and in my blood”, calls to me from Floodlights’ track Nullarboor.  

Ray LaMontagne suggests solace with “A man needs something he can hold onto, a nine-pound hammer or a woman like you” in Jolene - not long after he’s sung about not feeling like he belongs in the human race.

Lastly Nick Drake calls me from Place To Be:  “Now I’m darker than the deepest sea, just hand me down, give me a place to be.”

In these songs I reflect the artists are all searching for something, for me it’s their own Tūrangawaewae.  A beautiful word.  The literal etymology of it: tūranga (standing place), waewae (feet).  What a thing.  It’s something I’m looking for.  I’ve disaffected myself of the place I am physically in and am looking inward, backward to locate a centre.  It’s a search that brings me joy in the act of doing.

I can’t speak of, for, or hold any agency in Whakamā. That is not something I want to take.  And I’ve voluntarily spat the dummy with where I am and gone off on some privileged hunt.  I’ve never been pushed from my Tūrangawaewae, never had a thing taken from me in my life.  I just love the words, and I think they evidence that the indigenous culture of Aotearoa New Zealand in its whole, Te Ao Māori has the language, tools and potential to protect all people and things that exist here in Aotearoa - the air, land, water.  I guess I’m saying that perhaps a little less sad country music and maybe engagement with the Katiaki of the land I am in is a start.

Crepitus: being more aware

I have crepitus, when I stand from a crouched position, my knees crackle, grind. This noise is called crepitus. I wonder how closely linked to decrepit, the word is?

At our new home, we have a gully, that slides quickly to a wetland and pond. With this new wildish outlook, I notice new visitors: the Skylark, with its punk like tuft; the Swallows, with their orange shields and crossed sword tails.

Mlle. M. (19 m.o.) calls excitedly to the planes that fly overhead. Mlle. F. (45 m.o.) makes imaginative improvisations, layering a ‘cake’ from old bottles, new toys.

The hypothesis is that I notice the Swallows’ song, and I draw the link between my knees and ruination through neglect, for the same reasons the Mlles F. & M. notice what I have inured, or obscured for myself.