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MY LIFE AS A NINETEEN SEVENTIES GERMAN ART MOVIE
Posted 02.1.10 by annajohnson
I am not one to gossip. Much. But I thought I better let it be known that the mystery man, known as “birdman”, who sometimes inhabits the Double Bay ferry and wears olive green silk t-shirts… Well, he’s not free. I saw him for a fourth time on Friday evening. I was wearing my Monica Belucci uber-bosom white rayon sundress and Marcello was asleep on my lap. That was an Italian movie moment. The jetty was rocking softly as we waited for the seven pm final service home and Birdman came bounding through. He bounds he doesn’t walk. I beckoned him forth and he stood in front of me shifting from one sandaled foot to another. On the ferry I sat down the back and watched him bound on. Holding hands. With a woman who looked just like him, but ten years older than him. I like him even more now. IT was a scenario like a black and white film where small things happen that resonate more deeply. And I break life down into stills to help the repetition disintegrate and let the characters I see bleed into each other’s lives with more fluidity than the usual social roles allow. And in a puff of ferry petrol that little dream went drifting out over the sea wake and I reflected on the larger victories of the week. Marcello went to his first outdoor rock concert on Thursday night. Wrapped in a garbage bag and a sarong and hiding inside his stroller we waited in the pouring rain for the music to begin for more than an hour. ROGUE’S GALLERY was an album of sea shanties sung by a motley bunch of artists from Tim Robbins. Marianne Faithfull and Sting to Gavin Friday of the Virgin Prunes. The live concert promised that eccentric melange, plus the unlikely romance of being on Sydney’s waterfront in a full force wind. I felt for Cello. Just because we got free tickets didn’t mean he had to get soaked to the bone. But he’s a trouper. “Where’s the pirates? Where’s the rock?” is all he kept chanting as the water soaked our flesh. he was the only four year old in the mosh pit and when the music started he was on my shoulders, little fists in the air. He loved Peaches and I thanked Goddess he couldn’t really understand her lyrics. The intitial guilt of keeping my boy out and up for so long dissolved as the violins and guitars filled the air I forgot about my broken plastic poncho and Cello’s tiny wet feet. We were laughing and swaying and living. We stayed the distance till ten pm and went for sticky lime sherbet. By the end of the concert the rain stopped falling and a great big ocean liner left the harbour bellowing her horns. Magic. In bed, warm and dry we read pirate stories and felt like we had been at sea. “Don’t tell Granny” I whispered to him as I towelled his hair “But let’s tell Daddy everything!” “Yes Mum” he said sleepily “When is the next rock concert?” Soon, I thought to myself, very, very soon.
Till next time, KEEPING IT YUMMY.
XXX ANNA