My Body is a Temple

Thirteen months ago, I gave up alcohol. 

At the same time, I decided to give up drugs. 

Not hard drugs (which I’d be too chicken to ever take in case I started gnawing people’s faces off or drinking so much water my brain exploded), but any medication that might interfere with my brainwaves. 

You know, that superior intellectual brain of mine which I must protect at all costs. God forbid I should poison it with an aspirin. 

No painkillers, sleeping tablets, or even extra strong peppermints in thirteen months… nothing drug-related entered the Pink Temple.

My squeaky-clean body has adapted to this puritanical way of life with such enthusiasm that now I find myself feeling ‘drunk’ on a cup of coffee.

Scotto and I went to meet number three son for lunch recently before he took off to Europe on a Contiki trip. 

Arriving early, we decided to have a look around the shops after a quick (large and strong) coffee.

Fatal mistake. Five minutes after, my heart began to race, my eyes to twitch and I was jabbering faster than Alvin the Chipmunk. 

I felt an overpowering urge to run around with hands in the air screaming, or to chuck off my boots and slide along the tiles like Tom Cruise in Risky Business, or to pick Scotto up and carry him around on my shoulders shouting, “I’m here everybody! Come and get me!”.

I felt exuberant, euphoric.

The first thing I crashed into was one of those dodgy temporary booths selling imported items that look as if they fell off a truck on its way to the dump.

“A fairy booth!” I shrieked at Scotto. “Look Scotto! Little spotted toadstools. Little rabbits. Little chickens. Little cups and saucers. Little tables and chairs. Oh my God, Scotto! Look at the miniature rocks covered in moss! I want! I want!”

Grabbing a plastic tray, I careened around the booth sweeping miniature lampposts and trees into the tray, gushing like a nine-year-old at a unicorn themed birthday party. “I’ll have that! And that! And three of those! And, oh my God! One of those!” It’s embarrassing to look back on.

I swear the lady behind the counter thought I was as pissed as a parrot and this was her chance to make the rent money for the day. 

I couldn’t stop. If it was pink and sparkly, it was in the tray.

Afterwards, on the way home in the car, I slumped low in the seat holding my aching head wondering what I was going to do with all these child oriented little objects. 

They sat malevolently glowering at me on the kitchen counter for a few weeks, mocking me for my heady folly every time I wandered past.

“How old are you again, Pinky?” they’d taunt.

Eventually, after Scotto kept reminding me the bags were taking up valuable kitchen space, I moved them into my study.

A couple of weeks after that, Scotto set them up in little fishbowls for me. 

To what purpose I’m still trying to figure out.

Unless the Contiki trip produces a grandchild, I suppose.

Athletics Day and How Scotto Wants Me Dead.

The day began with a buoyant air of thrilling adventure.

The sky blazed like a jewel in a dazzling, azure radiance. Children spilled out across the oval squealing in gushy admiration of brand new, neon sports shoes, house themed tutus and brightly zinc-creamed noses. 

Jaunty rows of tiny flags fluttered in the cool breeze as if welcoming a ticker tape procession of heroic Greek gods.


The day ended as all the teachers knew it would; sweaty, fractious children squabbling over whose tattered, runner-up ribbons were whose, shattered teachers lurching around with rubbish bags, limply pointing at bits of lolly wrapper in the gloomy hope someone, anyone, would pick them up. Bunting, once gay and festive, now strewn across the field in torn, desolate shreds.

But at least it was Friday afternoon and we teachers knew that sport’s day was done and dusted for another year.


It was three o’clock and I was about to walk out the door, fatigued but exuberant to be leaving.

“Pinky,” intercepted our school officer, Reggie, poking her head around the corner. “There’s been an accident on the highway and the police have closed the road.”



I blanched. Sweat appeared in droplets on my upper lip. I felt the hysteria rise up my throat.

An accident meant the road could be closed for hours and hours.

And hours and hours.

And maybe even some more hours.

What the actual??? It was fucking FRIDAY!


“I suppose I can drive home via the alternate, rustic route,” I spat bitterly. “Even though it takes an extra 45 minutes and most of it is highly dangerous due to it being made of dirt.”



“You could stay and do some planning and wait for the road to open,” offered someone, trying to be helpful but being outrageously annoying instead.

Planning. As if. Lol.


So, I set out on the bloody road less travelled, comforting myself with the fact that I’d probably see a lot of interesting cows and goats and possibly a donkey and, as I like animals, that was quite a good thing. 

I could enjoy the bucolic scenery whilst listening to an extended podcast about mindfulness and I would arrive at home one hour and forty-fucking-five minutes later feeling very fucking serene.


Distracted, I failed to spot the ditch. It was carved deeply into the road and I was travelling at eighty kilometres an hour with a queue of frustrated drivers trailing behind me. 

There was no sign warning me I was about to traverse the Mariana Trench in spectacular airborne fashion with my trusty Renault. There was a sickening thud as the car landed. 

The cows paused their cud-chewing and gazed through exotic lashes at the foreign car leaping like a frog then sliding across the loose gravel. A goat screamed.


Swearing like a truckie, heart pounding with anxiety and palms sweating, I drove the rest of the way home, nervously anticipating the familiar tug on the wheel indicating a flat tyre.


“Can you check my tyres tomorrow morning?” I asked Scotto, throwing my keys on the dining room table in a vile temper. “I went over a bit of a bump on the way home.”



He forgot. I forgot as well until on Thursday morning, a sinister light began flashing on my dashboard informing me there was something seriously askew with my tyres.

In a panic, I screeched into a service station and rang Scotto. I’d parked beside the air machine and needed instructions on where to poke the thing in and what to do then.

“Don’t worry about it, Pinky,” drawled Scotto. “You have low profile tyres and you probably just knocked air out of one of them. You can drive on those sorts of tyres, flat. You’ll be fine.”


Now, I’m not sure if Scotto is trying to get me killed, or if he just couldn’t bear to go through the excruciating task of explaining to an idiot, how to pump up a tyre over the phone or if I inconveniently caught him on the toilet having a poo and he was in a fluster… but he was wrong... fatally wrong.

The tyre specialist man has since diagnosed two dangerously split sidewalls, compromised rims and the urgent need for a wheel alignment. 

Can you see that bulge waiting to explode?

The tyre man stressed that, at any time during my travels last week, I could have experienced a blowout and if it had occurred whilst travelling up or down the mountain, the car most likely would have flipped. 

According to the movies Scotto particularly likes, when a car flips over the side of a mountain there is usually fire, blood and crushed steel involved.

And you know what that means.

* Dead Pinky.

* Youngish, fancy-free widower with unimpeded access to whatever he wants to watch on Netflix and no more annoying interruptions to his morning poo.


In the meantime, I’d like to say, farewell $515. It was nice of you to visit my bank account. Hope you enjoyed your stay. Please enjoy the remainder of your travels in the tyre man’s wallet and I hope to one day meet again.

Nice Legs, Shame About the Boat Race.

Since giving up the booze, I’ve lost 10 kilograms and some people might now describe me as slim. My hair is quite long and from behind, I guess I could pass for someone much younger.

I’m not saying I’m Cher, okay, but from a bit of a distance, in a pair of jeans, I could be mistaken for a youthful female.

That might explain the guy in the supermarket.



He sauntered past me, leaning on his trolley and reaching for the grapefruit suggestively.

Sensing his presence, I swivelled around towards him and smiled pleasantly.

His lovely, expectant face plummeted from, “Well hellooooo, you young spunk rat, you” to “what the fuckity fuck in Jesus’ name is that? An incubus?” in a second flat.

Rapidly backing away, holding up two grapefruits as if they were magic shields and making the sign of the cross with them, he shuddered. He averted his eyes; his appalled eyes.

He anticipated Angelina Jolie and instead got Gollum.

Scotto was in another aisle, innocently counting the bruises on bananas during this romantic interface.

Bemused, I carried my kaleslaw over to him and threw it in the trolley with a certain panache, a modicum of swag, and a whole lot of groove.

“I just got checked out,” I announced.

It wasn’t a lie. I did get checked out. It’s not my fault my checker-outerer was slightly disappointed.

Caveat emptor.

“Did you?” Scotto pretended to be interested but was completely absorbed in his banana inspection.

“He was pretty young too,” I added. “Probs only in his late twenties. Actually, I think he was a hipster.”

“That’s nice,” Scotto mumbled. “Why do they put red stuff on the end of some types of bananas?”

“They’re organic,” I snapped. “Are you even listening to me?”

He put the bananas back on the shelf and sighed.

“Pinky, of course someone checked you out. You’re a hotty.”

I left it at that. No point in going on about it, is there?

Never Go Out at Night on the Mountain.

I visited a friend’s house on the mountain last night. I’d parked on the side of a dirt road and used the torch on my phone to tentatively pick my way down her driveway in the pitch blackness of our non-lit community.

As I started my car, a huge spider crawled lethargically up the windscreen right in front of my face. It disappeared under the sun visor.

“It was on the OUTSIDE of the windscreen,” I recited in a hysterical mantra all the way home. But I couldn’t be sure. I couldn’t be f#$king sure. Had I seen its belly or its back? All I’d noticed in my trauma was eight, long hairy legs and a fat torso with two prominent fangs sparkling in the moonlight.

If the spider decided to make a wanton cameo appearance during the drive home, I would surely drive over the edge of the mountain and hurtle down in a fiery ball of metal and gangly, arachnid legs.

“It’s only a bloody spider, Pinky,” I told myself, white knuckles gripping the steering wheel. “What’s the worst it can do? Bite me? Haha! F#$k you, Mr Spidey! ”

I felt a strange tickle on my ankle and swerved in blind panic, skidding on the gravelly verge and seeing my life flash before me.

Stomping the floor in unbridled terror, I sped up, careering around the mountain’s snaking bends, finally reaching my street.

I worried that if the spider was still lurking outside the car it might scuttle in when the door opened. Or worse, it might jump on me as I exited. Maybe it blew off in the wind? Maybe it flew off the car five kilometres ago? Maybe not...



Screeching up our driveway, I slammed on the brakes a millimetre from the garage door and hunched, shuddering, frozen to my seat, praying that Scotto would come out to greet me like he usually did.

His face at last appeared from behind the front door; the dogs spilling out after him, excited for their pre-bedtime wee.

Pressing my face against the car window, I knocked desperately on the glass to get his attention.

Scotto’s expression changed from sleepy to mildly curious.

As he approached my car in the dim light, I rapped frantically, mouthing the words ‘HELP ME… GOD! PLEASE HELP ME! BUT DON’T OPEN THE DOOR!!!! DON’T OPEN THE F#$KING DOOR!’

Before I could stop him, he yanked open the driver seat door, grinning naively.

“Get the f$#k out!” I shrieked, violently pushing him aside, leaping like a whirling dervish from the car. “Shut the f$#king door. Shut the door!”

Scotto spun around with panic in his eyes. The dogs froze, legs cocked in the air, eyeing me in alarm.

“There’s a f#$king s-s-s-spider!” I hissed, frantically thrashing my body and hair like someone on crack attempting to do the Macarena.

Scotto’s face instantly morphed into Liam Neeson.

“Go inside, Pinky,” he muttered in a rich and deep, Irish brogue and braced his shoulders with manliness.

I scarpered in the front door as he followed me towards the pantry with determination oozing from every macho pore.

“I don't know who you are. I don't know what you want,” he chanted. “But what I have are a very particular set of skills. If you leave now, that'll be the end of it. I will not look for you, I will not pursue you. But if you don't, I will look for you, I will find you, and I will kill you.”



He grabbed a can of Mortein Extra Strength.



I sat in bed, eyes all googly in fear and constantly checking there was no spider hiding in my hair when Scotto came in. 

He’d discovered the malignant creature, evilly burrowed inside the handle of the passenger door, safe from the wind and concealing itself until malevolent opportunity arose.

Now its remains were spread over our driveway like vegemite on toast. Itsy Bitsy spider was in itsy bitsy bits.

Some people might think we’re cruel.

After all, a spider is much smaller than we are. The spider is probably more scared of us than we are of them.

Well… I don’t think that’s true. I mean, has a spider ever told you that?

No?

I didn’t think so.

The Curse of Opening Night in the Theatre!

We all hovered around the backstage mirror last night. 

It was the opening night of our play. 

Stomachs churned, hearts palpitated and eyeliner pencils were brandished with such rapid dexterity, they were literally smoking.

“We must remember not to say the name of that Scottish play,” I quipped into the mirror as I squinted, attempting to pick a clump of mascara off my cheek without leaving a big, black, indelible smear.

My fellow thespians stopped abruptly, contouring brushes in hand, and stared at me.

“What are you talking about, Pinky?” asked Jess our ingenue, the youngest cast member.

“You know! The Shakespearean play! The Scottish one that starts with ‘M’. The one where you aren’t supposed to EVER say the name in a theatre.”

She stared at me as uninterested as … you know, whatever.

“Do you mean Midsummer Night’s Dream?” queried another actress who was checking her teeth for errant lipstick.

“No!” I exclaimed. “And DON’T say the name of it!”

“Much Ado About Nothing?” called out another.

“For God’s sake, no! It's not Much Ado About Nothing!” I shuddered like someone just walked over my future grave. 

“Don’t say the bloody name of the play! Do you want to be cursed? Do you want the theatre to fall to rubble around us? Do you want that dodgy, antediluvian lighting box to explode and for poor old Brian to die a horrible fiery death and have his eyeballs melt in a puddle?”

“Measure for Measure,” declared Alison. “That’s my favourite of Shakespeare’s plays!”

“How about the Merry Wives of Windsor?” added Emily. “I like that one.”

“Is the Merry Wives of Windsor a play about a Scottish king?” I asked, exasperated beyond belief.

“Oh, I know which one you mean,” Jodie declared, phoofing up her golden mane. “You mean the play with the witches and the 'Bubble bubble, toil and trouble' stuff.”

“Finally!” I sighed. “We can’t say the name of it… okay everyone??? Don’t ever say it out loud. EVER!!!”

They gazed at me with a look that said, who the bloody hell was ever going to randomly say it anyway, you idiot?

“Why can’t we say it?” Jess piped up after the silence.

“Because it’s cursed. It’s an old theatre tradition that you NEVER say the name of the play out loud. It's something to do with black magic and spells.”

“Cursed?” her eyes went like saucers. 

I love young people. I can teach them so much. 

"Now, I'm scared!" her voice quavered.

“Yes!” I said. “You should be damn well scared. In fact, I can tell you a real-life story!” I paused for dramatic effect. I love a captive audience. 

“One time, a few years ago," I began in a Vincent Price impersonation, "a struggling theatre group in North Queensland were performing the play, Macbeth, in a derelict old quarry and…”

I slapped my hand over my mouth in alarm.

The cast collectively turned their heads in horror, mascara wands held aloft, their faces stricken in dread. 

“Thanks a lot, Pinky!” shouted Jess, as she stomped out of the dressing room. “Now we’re all going to bloody die.”


We didn’t die though. And neither did the play. It went very well. 

But I do worry about Brian in the lighting box. It is a very old theatre.