The Ominous Presence

by The Archmage

I was wondering what would happen if I wrote all these down, and tried to make sense of them all. And it has been quite interesting making some connections that I had not suspected. But as the bitter old nun from down Dominion Road was trying to indicate to those around her death-bed, you also have to remember some of the good things that happened in your life, and some of the outright hilarious episodes as well, because when it comes to the end, as the ominous presence closes in, that is what you will remember the most.

The Old Lady in the Bamboo. 

My mother was visiting Mrs Partridge in the town, and I was dragged along. Maybe it was the weekend, as it quite a few people seemed to be at home that day. Mrs Partridge had to check on a pony in a paddock nearby, so myself, my mother and Mrs P. and her daughter Sharon traipsed off around the corner to the field. The two adults were discussing horses in the usual country way, so Sharon and I went off across the paddock and explored the thicket of bamboo that used to be there. it was quite atmospheric within the clumps of bamboo, and Sharon said it seemed spooky. I didn't think so and said we should climb the skinny bamboos, as we had been doing near where we lived, by bending them over and climbing on.

I attempted to shinny up a skinny trunk, but slipped the short distance back down, landing on my back on the soft ground. Then there seemed to a rush of wind in the bamboo tops above. So lying there on the soft damp ground on my back - then in the distance, about 20 metres or more through the bamboo, I saw an old lady, walking from right to left, parallel to the road, not looking my way. I must have got her attention, I was certainly trying to - and she turned and came clomping through the bamboo, from the road direction. I remember her face well, but did not recognise her at all. She was wearing off-white brownish flowing country type clothes that any old lady might go for a walk in. 

At this point she came up to me, on my left side, lying on the ground. She did not seem that interested in my situation. She looked down at me, pointed her stick at my knee, and said something along the lines of "Oh you silly boy." And appeared to point or jab her stick at my knee. This is about when I realised about then that there was a big shard of bamboo poking out, embedded in the underside of my knee. 

Sharon, on my right, shrieked at the sight of it of my knee and went running off to tell the grown-ups. The old lady didn't say anything else, she just carried on walking, out of the bamboo thicket, passing behind my mother and Mrs Partridge, crossing the paddock and disappearing over the bank where the Patea stream is. 

Rather unhelpfully left to my own devices - I got up and started hobbling, I think in some pain, don't remember that, and with Sharon's shrieking my mother and Mrs.Partridge realised there was a bit of an emergency, with quite an injury in my knee. I was crying and moaning that the old lady in the bamboo had stabbed me in the leg. That's when Sharon said, after hesitating a bit "But there was no one else there." 

I sort of clicked that there was a problem. She had walked past my mother and Mrs Partridge and they had not seen her either.

I was picked up and whisked across the fence to the road. Mrs Partridge said the house in front of us was the Walker's place and that Mrs Jill Walker would likely have a first aid kit. We bustled up the front steps and urgently banged on the door, which was quickly opened as the whole Walker clan appeared to be a home that day. Mrs Walker did have a first aid kit and a big pair of tweezers that looked like scissors. I was dumped on the dining table with all the crowd crowding in for a look, as Mrs Walker got the big tweezers in to action and pulled the shard out of my knee, then applied purple disinfectant to the wound. 
And then there was much chin-wag and gossip between the families, for the next fifty years. 

Afterwards I would always look at the bamboo patch, the paddock, and the dip at the edge of it down in to the creek. I even explored that area once, and could not see where the old lady could have been going? What was she doing there? I also used to check the streets around that area, really expecting to see her doing a domestic geriatric daily routine of taking a dog for a walk, hopefully this time visible to other people, but I never did see her. 

What are these memories. The old lady is visible in my mind as clear as a bell. And at the time she seemed perfectly real. And all in broad daylight. Is she some sort of memory of Grandma and Auntie Pat, there is certainly a resemblance, but it is definitely not my aunt, and she would have tripped over something coming through the bamboo thicket. And if this old lady I saw was somehow connected to them, they were both still very much alive, so not a ghost? Recently I have pondered the event, and wondered whether she didn't actually stab me in the knee, but instead just pointing out the big bamboo splinter or shard, and the blood. Then wandered off and left me there. 

Another possibility is my maternal great grandmother, who did that sort of thing. 

Old Mrs Vickers doesn't pop.

A long time ago, when I was very little, I must have been invited to Ross Vickers's place. Although I suppose this never happened again. Anyway - on with the story. Ross and I were to be dropped off somewhere close by, and were to go in the back of the Vickers's large car, with Ross's elderly grandmother. 

So, very tall adults, as in Ross's mother, sternly told us that we were to be very quiet and gentle in the back of the car as the old lady was going to pop soon and was very fragile.

Well. Old Mrs Vickers in the back of the car turned out to be rather a skinny, wrinkly old lady, not exactly bursting at the seams. However, I was not going to miss this one.

So I sat very still, as ordered, and watched very carefully. 

And waited.

And waited.

And waited.

That's about 10 seconds in young boy time, I suppose. And nothing happened. Old Mrs Vickers gave a rather worried sideways look in my direction. So I got the courage up and asked..." Are you going to pop soon." 

Mrs Vickers in the front seat seemed to be rather agitated. 

"Like a balloooon?" I asked. 

Old Mrs Vickers now gave me a rather bemused smile and answered. "Oh yes, I'm going to pop very soon." 
So I continued my watch. Waiting. But we were quickly dropped off and they drove on. I watched intently, to see whether she would go splat over the windows, but nothing happened. Leaving me none the wiser and a bit disappointed.

The Lonely Mountain

Cool, high, cloud shrouded, the mountain sits out on the coast with its feet in the cold water. Mountains normally like to hang around together in garrulous groups. This mountain, on its own, on the coast can see the others, in the distant, the big three, the garrulous triumvirate, there's Ngaurahoe, the aquiline chain smoker, the ponderous and portly Ruapehu and the wannabe a big mountain Tongariro. They are usually garrulous but are occasionally prone to spats of sulphuric tantrums.

Chainsaw -Magpie field

My first seeming conscious memory is waking up in the cot, at the farm house, hearing a buzzing in the distance, that I know is a chainsaw. The sound of chainsaws is one of the most common farming country sounds you can get. And I must have seen someone using a chainsaw previously to know this.
The other memory is different. In a field, near the farm seemingly, a sunny day, and the chorus calling of the magpies. I seem to be waiting, have been for a long time. Beyond that, not sure what this was about but that it was important, and I often wondered where the field was and whether I could go back to it.  

On the Farm

My sister came first, the my brother and then me. My sister had a plastic doll and a pram. She experimented on the doll with the wood rasp, grinding its face off. And then biffed the other dolls out and used the pram to carry around her favourite bricks. She thought we came along for medical experimentation. She suggested my brother eat some white stuff which she said was ice cream, turned out to be highly acidic caustic soda, fast trip the doctor there. Next she suggested he jump in a puddle on the farm, which turned out to be the sewerage sump, he disappeared in to it but a neighbour who saw the experiment in practice quickly reached in and grabbed him by the hair and pulled him out - and presented the evidence to my mother.

Silver Streak, New Plymouth Airport, Farmers Co-op extension, Kapuni Gas Flare

Not much used to happen around our neck of the woods. When the town's Farmers Co-op extended their shop, we all turned up for that, waiting outside until it opened, and all barging through for a look.

When the new New Plymouth airport building was opened, we all turned up for that and had a good gawk at the new terminal building.

On Friday or Saturday nights it was a big thing to go and see the big Kapuni gas flare, at the industrial site at the base of the mountain. For some reason they used to burn off excess gas, creating a big gas flame flare that could be seen for country miles. It was near the big perimeter fence by the railway, and there were usually lots of people - looking at it. 

And then the Railways Department decided to modernise rail transport with the snazzy new Silver Streak, and sent it off on a tour of the country railway lines. This meant it passed through Taranaki, and we all lined the route to get a view of it rattling past. The Railways Dept on the other hand, thought the odd behaviour of the Taranaki people crowding the railway right the way across the province so dangerous they threatened not to send it that way again.

Sole Rd aeroplane crash

It must have been the holidays, I was outside the house, down the road a bit, probably annoying grasshoppers in the long grass beside the road, on a fairly calm sunny day, another day when nothing happens in Taranaki. I noticed a puttering, spluttering engine sound, and a small aircraft suddenly came, somewhat swinging in to view, around the tall dark trees, at half their height, just missing the branches, and leaving a light trail of blue smoke. It passed from the left to the right, over the hedge on the right hand side of the road, and then made appropriate aircraft crashing noises. 

This is not your average daily event in the backwaters of New Zealand. I hesitated, wondering whether to go and investigate, or thought, would it really be far too serious and I had better tell my mother, back at the house. 

Silly me. I rushed back to the house and told my mother that an aeroplane had just crashed in the farmers paddocks. 

"Rubbish, aeroplanes don't crash around here." my mother declared. I was forbidden to go out and have a look, she was not having any of this nonsense. 
A fire engine screamed past the house, down the road, followed by an unlikely amount of traffic. 

"The neighbours boys must be having a BBQ in the hay barn again" declared my mother. They got a smack the last time they did that.
Then planes were flying over head at low altitude, round and round.
"It must be an airshow" declared my mother. 

A few days later of continued monotonous existence, and my mother was reading the local rag of a newspaper, when she suddenly gasped with astonishment. "Good heavens, there was an aeroplane crash down the road." She got such a surprise she nearly threw the paper on the floor.
This may have been about the time my mother did a big swot for her Russian exams. She thought Russian would be interesting. This caused a blip in the UK with MI5 who called my grandfather in to ask why his daughter was learning Russian. As one of Britain's specialists in nuclear bomb detonators, they were rather concerned. Not that we knew that, way out in the back blocks of NZ where nothing ever happened, much.

Maori music tape.

My mother sent her father and his second wife, Noreen, a tape of Maori music as they were interested in it. My grandfather's mother had been an opera singer, his father a doctor. The opera singer was supposed to have had quite a presence to her. You would need that to be an opera singer, and to transmit your presence across a stage and audience. It seems to have scared her daughter-in-law, my grandmother.

On receiving the tape my grandparents put the music tape on in their system, in their living room, they were both sitting in chairs. At the moment, Noreen says, my great-grandmother, the opera singer, appeared standing behind the chair my grandfather was in, and was listening to the music. Noreen said she, the old lady, was perfectly solid and obvious. Noreen pointed out to my grandfather that his mother was standing behind him. He was rather perturbed by this. He did not look around, but told his mother that she should not be doing this sort of thing. He did not seem to doubt what Noreen was seeing. And at that my great-grandmother quietly or politely disappeared. I was sitting in that living room when Noreen told me this, pointing out the chair.

I have slept in both my grand-father's death beds, which creeped me out, but slept like a log. My maternal grandfather there, was making rude remarks out the bathroom window to my mother, when he dropped dead on the floor of the bathroom, so I suppose that does not count as a deathbed.

My paternal grandfather fell off the loo late at night downstairs at the house, but managed to get upstairs to his bedroom. So he dropped dead in bed. The next morning everyone turned up for his 90th birthday. 

Walkers haunted garage

My brother and I were next door, on the rare occasion when one of the neighbour's children were in residence. My brother and Keith were enthusiastically trying out their small bicycles. I was still confined to a tricycle. I think the one my mother ran over in the driveway later on. We were in their garage, an open fronted old basic thing at the bottom of the long driveway. I was sitting on my tricycle in the middle, and Keith and Jeremy were cycling round and round. 
Out of the blue, a loud voice, or loud whispers, directly above me went, "Hilary." My sister's name. It was so unexpected I got a major fright and bolted out of the garage narrowly missing being run over by both bikes. 

Jeremy and Keith were much surprised by this action, they came peddling after me wanting to know what had happened. I told them. They hadn't heard a thing. But we decided, maybe it was a message and we should go check on Hilary. We dashed across the bull paddock to the house, and found Hilary and my mother calmy, quietly reading. No alarm. 

After that I always considered the garage haunted and would not go in to it, even though it was a wide open basic thing. It somehow always managed to look dark.

The Witch in the woods.

I stayed at the Hustons one time, they were nice people. Mrs Huston had a dog called Tuppence and we took it for a walk up the paddock right behind their house which leads on to some dark trees. It was a nice pleasant day, but then Tuppence took off towards the trees. Mrs Huston freaked out, and screamed to Tuppence to come back. She explained that there was a witch that lived over there and it was best we didn't go near. I was fascinating that they had a witch residing so close, but was a bit worried she would come down the paddocks to the house at night. I think that must have been the only witch I knew of in the area, not that I ever saw her. I tried that one at school during story time later, but it did not go very far.

The Dreamless Sleep.

At school, the other kids used to make up these crazy fantastical stories about what they had dreamt about the night before. I wondered why they made up such silly stories. And did my best to out do them, I suppose. I didn't know what dreams were, and never had them after my usual night time routine tangling with the ominous presence. I just faded out in to the dreamless sleep and woke up back in the same place. After the big strange monster had been, and done its bit.

We had moved from a very quiet farmhouse far away from the road, to a house by a busy main road and a railway line, near the top of a hill, and it was back in those days, with the last of the steam trains puffing and grunting slowly up the hill, getting closer and closer. 

I wonder whether this is why I equated the process of the big monster thing, coming clomping up the hill and across the paddocks every night, vast jaws agape, to envelop or swallow me again. Very scary but I thought it was normal, and you just had to lay still and wait for it to pass over, through, or whatever, and for it to disinterestedly to go trotting off down the passage, by now seemingly a bit smaller. I went through it from behind so I never really saw it, but I always knew the proximity of the ominous presence. The sensation started in the toes and then a quick rip up my body, a ticklish sensation like a piece of paper being taken out of an envelope. And then I would fade out, out of body, but not going anywhere, and wake up back again in the morning to another day.

I equated the ominous presence to a monster, a dragon or a hippopotamus at the Auckland Zoo which we had seen when we went up to see my grandparents, so was that what I was dealing with? Visually I never saw it, never looked at it, until it had gone past. All very odd now. The ominous presence was very scary, but I thought that was what everyone did, and it was never painful and did not seem to do any damage. And after it had been through I would fade out in to the dreamless sleep.
It was only when this process was disrupted that I refused to go, and held the monster back, refused to go with it. And much to my surprise, found I could.  So there it lurks, and has ever since. 

But it was only after that that I found out about normal sleep patterns, and what a surprise, dreams. These dreams are all so usually very odd and inconsequential and really incoherent. And frankly rather daft.

Elizabeth Houston disappears. 

Elizabeth H. stayed over. I always liked her and the Hustons. I think it was a one night stay before going back to her place the next day. Were we going to take her back in the car. Or was Mrs Huston going to come over to us? I liked Mrs Huston and wanted to say hello. My mother and sister seemed to have other ideas and did not seem to want me around. 

They said it was time for my afternoon nap. But I did not want to miss Mrs Huston visiting. All three were looking at me. Waiting. For me to go have my 'nap.' I could delay that and says hello to Mrs Huston, I rather remonstrated. They still all three looked at me. Waiting. I smelt a rat. But got sent to bed up the end of the house for my usual afternoon 'nap.' My 'napping' was not your usual situation, as I found out later when I stopped doing it.  

Thoroughly distrusting them, I did my usual process at high speed I think, shot through the window and flew down to the garage, passing through the wall, and hovering in the rafters in lucid image mode.  

Sure enough, they came scuttling down, it must have been winter, they were in dark clothes and rain coats, they got in the car and drove out. I remember Elizabeth briefly looked up and seemed to look right at me in the rafters. So I had the evidence, and then I faded out in to the dreamless sleep. I didn't seem to have an ability to follow the car, or didn't think about it.  

When my official nap ended I woke up again in the bedroom, stomped down to where my sister and mother were, demanded to know where Elizabeth was, and that I had seen them all leaving.  

They still looked guilty but assured me that Mrs Huston had come and taken her. Not according to what I saw, as I pointed out. They assured me that I had not seen anything, because I was having my frigging nap.  

I still don't know the answer. It was about the only time I recall that I went that far. They can answer that question 

Relda Familton  

In the place where nothing happens we used to watch the TV a lot, in black and white. The TV nightly host enthusiastically doing the weather forecaste was the ebullient Relda Familton who was quite the famous celebrity in New Zealand. She and the other regular people we saw on the goggle-box were a world away and surreal as far as we were concerned.  

And then, big puff of smoke and Relda Familton is in the living room nattering on about dogs. She met my mother at a dog show. It usually rains a dog shows. My brother and sister were totally stunned, my mother pretended not to be.  

This would have been a big highlight of my life, except I was out - down the road where airplanes usually don't crash, walking the dogs.  

Stretcher bearer 

It was the war time, at that time called "The Great War," as round two was many years away. I was a stretcher bearer at the front, big bomb pot holes and mud everywhere. We had to pick up same mortally wounded soldiers, I don't remember who was at the other end of the stretcher but we had a soldier on it, and when I looked down at him, I realised I knew him. But from present life, in my class.  

The doctor's daughter runs us out of town 

When my mother got home one day, she casually mentioned she had bumped into Marie, the doctor's daughter, that's the glamorous Marie, while out buying me some new underpants, and that Marie had helped her decide what ones to get.  

Well, aghast, complete mortifications. A typical dip-stick parental sort of thing to do, and with Miss A+ glamour queen herself. If Marie and her coterie had had t-shirts in those days with "You can't sit with us." on them, they would have worn them out.  

And I had to go to school the next day. Dreaded, but sure enough, the next day came along and I had to go to school. Immediately greeted by Marie, informing me of the ignominious event from the day before. Her totally obedient acolytes, Susan F. and Helen K, chortling in triumph. Me wondering whether I could hide under the desk.  

Fortunately we left town after that, and not soon enough, my brother didn't want to go at all, had a big blub about it, I couldn't wait, nothing to see around here, move along. Time to go.  

Fluff 

My sister, brother and I were coerced in to going to church by our step-grandparents on Christmas day. It was a very serious sort of Presbyterian affair. Maybe it would help turn us in to nice christian people. My brother was wearing a somewhat fluffy woolen jersey, My sister started quietly pulling the fluff of his jersey. My brother got the giggles. But tried to hold it in and not make a noise. My sister kept pulling fluff of his jersey. He kept trying not to giggle. He held his mouth and then his nose in the attempt. And then failed in one big sneezy sort of blast. We weren't invited to the high and dry Presbyterian churches again.  

Rock Fall 

A long time ago. A mud hut village, as the few others in the region were as well, so typical. A typical village life. A lush green environment, a river curving around, a large hill with trees and rock caves at the base.  

At some point I met up with a guy and we got together, and decided to move in to one of the caves and do it up, with carvings and paintings on the wall. A good bit of interior decorating that the village elders and family all seemed to quite like and were quite impressed about it all. They used to come over and give us food, and so village life carried on. All a very pleasant domestic life. 

But carving bits out of the walls must have been a bad idea, some time later there was a rock fall, and my other half got killed, leaving me heart broken and shocked, I remember carrying his body away, he was smaller than me.  

Such things we remember over time, love, and love lost dramatically. But names are a different matter, not so easily remembered, or transferred through time. 

I went back and had a look. but it is all agricultural land now, much smaller looking, the hill denuded of trees, the caves seemed to be filled up. It was somewhere in South America.  

Grandragon on Force 5 

My maternal grandparents had been in a messy divorce many years earlier. When she was visiting my brother and I asked our grandmother, sometimes known as the Grandragon, who or where our grand-father was. This set the Grandragon off in quite a tantrum, saying that he had abandoned her at the beginning of World War II and that she had had to go out and work in a potato field. This was quite a good tantrum, the house started shaking, the lights started swinging and I was holding on to my seat as she raved on a full force 5 earthquake rolled through. I could see out the window the house lift and wobble around as the earthquake rolled under. The Grandragon went on unperturbed.  

As it was, by then we had tracked down our grand -father, who was by then specialising in the nuclear bomb detonators under a field in Hampshire. He had a different story, saying he couldn't get away fast enough, and left with a wheel barrow and two chairs. So there was a lot of "He says, she says." The photos of their wedding day show up. The body language is such that it looks like she has an hard attitude of "I got it right this time," which she had. But it makes me wonder what happened before hand. It looks like she was on the rebound from a failed relationship that never quite worked out, and withy the aftermath of World War 1 all sorts of things could have happened. He says, he says, he says - that he was young and very naive and that she hooked him.    

Princess Ann 

There was a royal visit to the seaside town. We were keen to go but my mother did not want to go as usual. When the Queen had visited Taranaki the whole town turned out, except us. I suspect she was worried my sister would suggest quietly to my brother that he see if he can tie the Queen's shoe-laces together.  

This time we were close to the main part of the seaside town and could go without my mother to see Princess Ann. There was a big crowd up the main street. I was in it ready to gawp at a real life Princess. She came along look very nice and pleasant and stopped in front of me and started talking to me. I carried on gawping and wonder, gosh, she speaks nicely. And carried on gawping. The princess was obviously adept at this sort of thing and quickly switched to the guy standing next to me, and had a quick natter to him, he was over the moon about it. I carried on gawping.  

Spaghetti Bomb 

At school we used to get sent off into the bush every year on a rather torturous camping week away from the national grid. The NZ bush is usually damp and cold. And any cooking has to be done over a camp fire. We had a good large bon-fire going in the dark and various of the boys had put their cans for food in the side with a hole in the top. We were sitting around having general conversation when there was a hell of a bang, and we were all sprayed with hot red spaghetti, one of the guys had forgotten to put a hole in the top of his can.  

The camping in the bush involved the use of a lot of slashers (long axes) to clear enough space in the wet cold undergrowth to stick up a tent. All this destruction was eagerly carried out by the boys, until one of them slashed straight through a bee's nest. A zillion angry bees came swarming out and found a lot of targets - fleeing in all directions.  

Cow's eye ball lands on plate after biology class at school. One of the guys at the school, his father worked at an abattoirs, so he brought in a whole plastic bag full of eye balls. Yuck. 

Hotel Foyer - Gossomer Balloon 

I got a bug, as we all eventually did, and felt very ill. I went down to the restaurant with my family, but one look at food and I knew I couldn't do it. I said I would go back to our hotel rooms; my mother told my sister to go with me as she thought I looked a bit pale. My sister wanted her dinner and was not impressed, and marched off to the lifts. I tried to keep up but couldn't - and bang, went down. 

And 'twing.' In another lifetime, it was very pleasant, seemed way up high. I seemed to have been there forever, and there were others there as well, dimly, not really doing anything. If anything the best description is a few gossamer balloons in a row, floating happily away. There seemed to be something in the distance, we were outside something. We seemed to communicate, but not say much. It was all very pleasant. 

And 'vomp.' I get yanked down. Back down.  

The first thing I notice is people yelling and running. I notice the cool polished floor, which seemed quite comfortable. I'm back, much to my annoyance. It was all quite pleasant, now I'm lying on the floor causing a floor show with people all around being very concerned. 

Knight in Shining Armor 

The is a big cathedral, dark, night time, medieval lit candles, a service going on. The knights are at the front in the aisle, in full battle gear, kneeling for the benediction of the bishop, who is in front of me. The Cathedral is crowded, apprehensive, and it seems there are a lot of people outside as well. I am, what?, an acolyte, junior priest? Whatever they are called. Holding a candle or something. I can see the knights. I know some of them, and the one at the front on the right was a complete brat, but now he is kneeling to the Bishop receiving a blessing. There is a real war situation, but I can't remember whether it is them being blessed before going of to battle, or to defend the city. It was certainly dramatic and I am impressed that the brat is suddenly showing some unexpected heroic qualities.  

Focal Point up River 

The bush camping at school had been up the dirty brown river via a somewhat perilous road along the steep hillsides. There seemed to have been an old house along that road on a bit of a knole above the river, along the road just before it got to the steep and treacherous part, so at the edge of civilisation and the national power grid.  

From what I saw a lot of people seem to come and go from the house, or just hang around, we all know each other. It is quite social.  

A long time later, we go for a drive again up the river, and past the spot, no house there now, but not sure if there ever was one. It seems to be some sort of focal point above the muddy brown river. I would have liked to get out of the car and see what it was like, but we drive on.  

The Old Nun, St.Josephs, Hillsborough Rd, Waikowhai 

She is in the waiting room, it is very cold, winter, looks like Europe post WW2, there are a lot of other people, all heavily rugged up in big grey duffle coats, it looks like a queue, over there on the left a customs inspector booth, and in the middle a fire brazier of some sort for heat. Leaving on the ship for a country far away, and far away from war torn Europe. She sees the sun sparkling on the water, the sparkles start racing past, and then she is flying - at the destination, over the cove, over the Pohutukawas and the bay side bushes, over the road, to the big old white house, with its bay side views, and then later the new additions either end.  

She is a nun, and they are now taking over the house and getting it ready for the first batch of children, adolescents? A bunch of nuns, dirty, grunting and sweating away as they clean the place, it is a room downstairs, near the bottom of the stairs, she looks at the other nun and they both burst out laughing with the sight of it all.  

The children arrive, all noise, mayhem and carry on. And this goes on for many years. Later, she seems to be a bitter old woman, grumpy and achy. And now it is time to go.  

But she changes her mind about being bitter and despondent, and wants to tell them that, that after all the work and hard toil, she feels good. She feels fulfilled, although it would be hard to believe. She wants to tell them that. 

The next morning, it must have been late 1979, a day off, a Saturday? I burrow a bicycle as I had planned to do from someone at the student hostel in the city, and decide to head out, sort of south, along Dominion Rd. It is a warm day, and I get hot and sweaty, and it is a long road, I can see quite a way down the end in the shimmering heat, and keep going, and going. And going.  And down the end that I can see the road swings off to the left and up a bit, and I come out in front of the big old white house, with the new extensions on both ends. This was a big surprise. There are some young people, a group of some sort, playing a ball game out the front, they have a van that seems to have brought them here. I look around but cannot see any nuns.  

I don't ask any questions, stupid questions like are the any dead nuns here. I go around the back to the courtyard and still cannot see anyone. I can't leave the bike because I have burrowed it and don't have a lock. I wait awhile and then leave, heading back to the city.  

And now time has passed again, and I can look the place up on the internet, and it was a girl's school, St.Joseph's, Waikowhai, run by nuns. It seems to have been a 'bad girls' school, and that may have added to her dispirited attitude. But at the end, she felt good about it all and wants them to know that.  

2026 - And now I try to trace the old house and everything seems to have changed, I am sure I can see the house, but I can't see the big fugly school additions, and the courtyard around the back, and now it seems to be Hilsborough Heights Metlifecare old crumblies home. 

Lightening Xmas 

I went up north for Christmas to a friend's place. The house overlooked a lot of dark bushland with clouds curling over top and through the branches that I found very romantic and theatrical, as if it was a landscape for dragons.

It was Christmas day and we saw a flash of lightning in the distance so sat on a windowsill to see if there would be any more. Lightning storms are great entertainment, in the city you can see the storm watchers on their verandahs and door steps watching every moment. You can also see the other people doing the dishes or watching TV who are blind to the amazing spectacular put on for free outside. This storm we were watching over the dark bushland was not one of the more entertaining ones I have watched and seemed to be going nowhere. After the first flash in the distance there did not seem to be anything else happening at all.

Then there was a 'whizzsh' flash as a big bolt of lightning came down to our left, about 3 to 4 m in front of us, turned right at about our level and whizzed along in front of our feet to near the side of the house by a window. The detonation was almost instantaneous with the strange first sound, a real blast. So we certainly got our entertainment's worth, and the closest I have ever come to a lightning bolt. Later, I find I have transgressed in not phoning home for Christmas day. Making a toll call from someone else's house did not seem to me to be very polite so I had not done so. There were no more lightning bolts that day, just the first one in the distance and then the far too close for comfort one. Certainly a Christmas to remember. 

Mudflat 

This one is going off, a complete psychiatric episode, an armed intrusion into the people's bedroom and murderous attack, stabbing, lots of screaming. And then out the back, over the lawn, down the bank and on to the mudflats, so low tide. A long run across the mudflat, very hard work and breathing heavily. I wake up out of breath, gasping. I turn on the radio and the first article of news is that he has made it across the mudflats and in to the trees. They don't catch him until the next day.  

Maa Na Ma Naa 

Our sit down in Auckland was upstaged by a riot in Wellington. So we didn't get much publicity for it. The cameras had blood to focus on in Wellington, even if it had to be smeared a bit. I was standing up taking photos, but officially I was sitting down. But got whisked out the back by the police and put in a police car for awhile. Then had to pose with a very nice policeman, Mr No.6644 or something, and we both held the number card.  

And then we got carted off to police central, and 'processed' and sent to cells, one each, down a long corridor, with small holes in the door that you could just poke your face out.  

Being arrested with a bunch of dogmatic trotskyites can have its down sides. Despite the good acoustics in the cells, they wanted to sing "The Red Flag." And a bunch of recalcitrant Trotskyites feebly wheezing out "The Red Flag" is not pretty. 

Peter F. of the same name as a famously Australian singer was opposite me, and seeing if he could do some sort of gymnastics while holding on to the door that mean he ended up up-side-down at the window.  

The moribund choral ensemble down the corridor were still carrying on, so I put my face to the window and went "Ma Na Me Naa" - which is impossible to ignore and the Muppet Movie caught on down the corridor much more enthusiastically.  

Seriously, if you like singing in the shower, go get arrested. 

Serial Killer 

There was a suspected serial killer on the loose in the city. One night my sleep meandering's was doing it's usual wandering around, when I remembered the case and decided to track the killer down. He was living on the south side, Vauxhall, in an apartment in an old building, about three floors up. 

He could see me, straight away, and made a grab for me, across London, to where I was at high speed. It was right where I was, a very powerful force trying to take over my mind, to take control, and to continue its serial killing. I had a hell of a fight to get rid of it and break the contact, and made it very clear I wanted nothing to do with it. It tried to tell me why it liked stealing life, it seemed, but I wanted it out and managed to shut it out. Major ghastly fight and I stayed up for ages making sure it had not found any way of coming back. 

I'm sure I saw him in the street, a deserted street late at night, a good looking, sort of French guy, crossing the road, I moved on quickly.  

Escape of a Concubine 

Growing up in part of North Africa, I can locate it, Egypt sort of area, in a rural village. I get Roman Empire times sort of era, but not under the Empire. It is the usual village life, but the tax collectors are turning up, and we have to give them heaps. And my betrothed girlfriend is also gifted as concubine slave to the ruler in a sort of formal ceremony, whoever that ruler was.  

This did not go down with me. The tax collectors or soldiers camp was nearby which was quite make-shift, with a perimeter fence of wooden stakes, you could see through them. I organised with a group of my friends to spring my lady from the camp. We dressed as entertainers for the tax collectors and soldiers and were going to put on a show. Not sure how entertaining we were going to be but I clearly remember us outside the gate, all dressed up in our gear and make-up, and how the look of it made me burst out laughing, despite the dangerous mission we were on.  

5 Breaths 

It seems to be a rather spartan room, a hospital room maybe, or a care respite. Lying in bed. So maybe these are the last breaths. She wonders how many. Maybe five. She manages to take another breath slowly. 

It seems a fine sunny day. Outside. In the world which is still going on. Which she is leaving. She knows there are people in the room. Sitting quietly, waiting. She is keeping them waiting. It must be a few breathes away. Taking another breath. 

Should she know these people. Are they important. In these last days, now old withered, wasted away. Not even the ability to roll over, or turn to look. Even her memory has withered away. How many more breathes; she takes another breath.  

Should there be more fanfare. Should she be remembering things, her life? But all she is aware of is the room, and the light. And maybe the people. waiting. And taking another breath.  

Does it all end, now, she does not want to, but there is only the room left. Or just the quiet end. How many breaths to go now. Isn't her life supposed to flash before her eyes. The ominous presence now seems little more than a light glowing curtain waiting to be passed through.  

The white room... 

Voodoo. 

I got back to the apartment in London late one hot summer night after much partying and drinkies, cycling back as usual. There was a helicopter up ahead over where I lived, and as I got closer there turned out to be police swarming all over the area. It turned out a child had been murdered, and found in the park about 200m from where I lived. The next day there were police everywhere, as another child was still missing. Going in to a shop was risky, the women all muttering amongst themselves that when the catch the guy he should be castrated and strung up. The mother was on TV crying away and telling the guy to give up and to give her daughter back. I didn't see it as I do not have a TV.  

On the third day, in the hot summer heat, the smell of death drew the police to the location of the dead child, under the mother's mattress.  

Voodoo. 

5 Breaths part 2 

This situation leaves me feeling like a failed spirit guide. In her last moments she wanted company, someone to go along the way with her, but I pulled away, sharply, at the end, not wanting to go there. I should have warned her to breathe deeply,  concentrate on her feet, and get ready to twinkle her toes. 

Old House on North Shore 

An old house on the North Shore, done up a bit, but quite nice. A family living in it. I get a brief look. all very normal. Not sure what that one was about. I don't try to track it down.  

Household Slave 

It was a long time ago, there was a group travelling somewhere, looks like Gaul, or pre-Roman Germanic provinces. About the time of the Greeks I think. There is a raid on the group, many killed outright, the good pillaged, and a few taken away as slaves. One of them is a small boy, whose parents were slaughtered by the raiders. 

The raiders seem to be Greek, from a bayside, or seaside prosperous city, white buildings, tiled roofs. Quite an important city in their part of the world.  

The boy's new owners are quite well off and important, in this city, and he becomes part of the household chattels. There are other children, the children of the wealthy parents, and the mother is quite a beauty.  

The boy over time becomes a part of the family, and is quick witted and athletic, turning in to a big Germanic goth. He likes the mother and she encourages him to help her children, as he grows up with them, becoming indispensable to them and the household.  

He occasionally sees some of the other people taken in the raid, now scattered around the town, who talk to him in his own language, and remind him who he really is.  

As a household slave he has every day access to an important family, which gives him greater advantages then other local people. This access, and somewhat acceptance by the important family is quite an ego boost for him, and he could be quite a snob about it.  

When he is grumpy and depressed I seem to be his spirit guide, telling him to keep calm and keep going, as the situation is quite advantageous to him.  

So I seem to watch this one. As he advances through life, becoming a large athletic and intelligent person who in time is granted his freedom and becomes a military captain of some sort.  

Will he turn on them, and go back to his family? It seems not, He makes the best of the situation.  

Top Hat and Tails 

They were pissed or had been smoking joints, around the harbour in Sydney, with the Opera House and bridge. I got a good view from grey London, and wanted to go.  

I had decided to make my way back down south, either Australia or New Zealand. Did I dream or did I have a thought? New Years Eve in Aotea Square, and she would be in top hat and tails, hot pants so legs galore, and would walk past the bast of the old town hall leading to the square.  

I did stay in Sydney for awhile but then, silly me, thought I would go back to Auckland to finish the degree off. So headed back there. New Years Eve, at the base of the town hall, she walked past, coming across the road, in her top hat and tails, an Islander, looking forward to the evening, big smile on her face, walked past and out of sight.  

And I think we had a good party as well.  

Vote for Jo 

University politics is full of crazy stuff, and often revolves around the student newspaper. You had to be elected to the post of 'Editor' of the rag, and Jo wanted to try for it. I am not sure if it needed a policy platform, so Jo dressed as a horse and I dressed as a big red lobster and we started handing out flyers to promote her campaign. We got quite in to this after a while, and even went bouncing in and disrupting lectures to hand out our flyers all around the university. 

She was elected in by a landslide. And did a good job of it as well. 

Coffin Bananas 

Somehow I had been involved in a play at the university. I had wanted the small part where the hero gets dragged off to certain doom. But seemed to end up with the main part instead. All quite a fun experience I suppose. I avoided telling the flatmates about it but they found out and appeared right near the front seats on about the second night, as I noticed just as I started my bit.  

The start of the play involved a body in a coffin, the body being played by Michael K. All rather macabre, I wouldn't have done it.  

After the show finished we had to take the coffin back, at night, to the theatre warehouse place, with Michael K and I carting it through the carpark under the terrace where all the engineers were having the very alcoholic piss-up. We were greeted with a rain of bananas, some of which landed in the coffin, as someone else had the lid, Mat I think. He had to go off and get the keys in his rattley old car, so Michael K and I sat on the coffin outside the warehouse, in a somewhat isolated part of the campus, in the ever increasing dark. I was so glad when Mat's rattly old car finally did turn up with the keys and we could dump the coffin and get out of there. 

Skull 

In my perambulations, I stayed in a friends room while he went off somewhere for a few days. He had a rather macabre sense of humor, or was just rather macabre, as he had a skull in the bedroom, which freaked me out. I hid it around the corner so that at least I would not have to see it. 

I ended up seeing a youngish dark skin girl, longish dark wavy shiny here, and big smile, whol  liked to be remembered. She was quite pleased about it. I suppose skulls and bones are just like seashells, and I have enough of them around the house here. If you listen closely you might just hear something. 

Norman in the Clothes Shop 

Norman was a rather large alsatian dog, and quite a character. However, he didn't like fireworks and fire crackers. One time I got back to the house and found him stuck under my bed, four feet waving frantically. I had to lift the bed and pull him out. Another time we were walking along Ponsonby Rd and he must have heard a fire cracker. I didn't notice anything. But Norman shot into a clothes shop and hid behind the back clothes racks looking very worried. Not as worried as the shop owners and various shoppers who got a big surprise. The floor of the shop was shiny lino, so I was able to push Norman across the floor while he did his best to resist, front paws extended doing everything possible to stop being pushed out of the shop. And a few apologies from me to the shop people.  

Langs Beach -Stars and Murder 

It is about 1990. We travelled north to hang around the Waitangi Day celebrations and see what happened with the Hikoi crowd. So we stopped the first night at Waipu beach and camped there, a very nice place, long, long, wide flat beach. In the summer evening we had some sort of bbq right on the beach, the tide out, and went for long walks across it all. The tide had just gone out, it was a moonless night, and the sand was still wet, the starry night above was clearly reflected in the mirror image of the wet sand under, so walking along was like walking in the stars, and quite amazing. The other two took the Norman the dog for a walk along and chat with any of the other campers along the way, walked straight into a camp of geriatric nudists. 

The next day at Waitangi, we were down on the beach, across from where the main celebrations take place, and from where all the big Maori war canoes went out to do the sea going part of the it all. We did not have a very good view of this, but then the big canoes all came back, and were surfing in on any waves, the paddlers jumping off and breaking out in noisy hakas for each canoe, which was an unexpected and amazing show, we having to dodge out of the way as they got going. All in all quite worthwhile. I think this is the year th e Hikoi got to within about two hundreds metres of the big Marae there, but then they all stopped for a meeting and impromptu hui, and couldn't make up their minds what do to, so they turned around again and went back to the other marae nearby where they had spent the previous evening. 

About a year later I was up that way again staying at Langs beach, the house up high on a headland, a short drive from the beach, or a pleasant walk down the narrow road to it. In the evening I thought I would wander down to the beach on my own and see if I could do the walk in the stars again.  

The first thing to give me a fright was the big possums crashing around in the bushes up the driveway, as they munched their way through all the native greenery. The NZ possums I am sure have morphed into much larger versions than the little ones in Australia. The were right up close running around me, but I carried on. The road down to the beach is quite narrow, so I was right on the edge of it in case any cars came along, but I don't recall any. Nearer the bottom of the road, near the beach is a darker section with the bushes and trees coming right up to the road side, and no street light, so it was quite creepy as I was not used to that, but I could see the beach further on the occasional street light, and rows of houses with the lights on. At this point an old guy walked past on the other side of the road, I think we nodded sort of thing, as happens when you are the only people around, on a dark night.  

I made it through the dark patch and to the beach front, not many people around at all at this time of night, but down the end there was some sort of party going on in one of the houses, where they were letting off spectacular sky-rocket after sky-rocket, quite unusual as they were by that time banned. But it made a nice part of the expedition, which by then I was needing to make the whole thing worthwhile. The beach is angled much more steeply than the Waipu one, the sand was dry, so there was basically no stars all round effect to speak of. So that much was a failure, so I was having to treat the whole thing as just an evening walk to get some air, sort of thing. I walked along quite a way at the water's edge, out in the dark almost, and then gave up on it and turned back.  

Walking back I stayed at the water's edge as long as possible, so was quite a distance from the road and would have been barely visible to the road. There was one or two not very strong street lights up by the road, and two guys by a coloured sort of Anglia car, and old Anglebox as we called them, even then. They were two youngish white guys. The sort of car would have been their first car. Louts, my mother would have said. Types, my aunt would have said.  

But then they saw me, a long way away, and immediately started agressive cat-calling and shouts. I was quite surprised by this, a totally random act of more than rudeness, outright strange aggression, against someone a long way away that they could hardly see. So I carried on along the water's edge and skirted around them as far as possible,  to further on at the end of the beach, or the beginning  of the beach, and up to the road.  

I walked back up the narrow road the house, by then thoroughly unimpressed with the whole evening, right on the edge, out of the way as much as possible. I am not sure whether the two guys in the car came roaring up, I kept out of they way. I don't remember. But I got back to the house. Alive. Basically, unimpressed, but that was all.  

Some weeks later a dead body was found in the bushes there. It had been there some weeks. On older guy, unidentified. Murdered. The reports went on for awhile and I am not sure they ever identified him. And then report fizzled out and the world moved on. I check the internet now, but there is nothing. not that there is anything about the plane crash either.  

Tea Kettle 

I got a call from the gallery wanting to know if I knew where the kettle had gone. I was busy doing something but said - no. An odd phone call, why call me about the kettle, it should be in the kitchen. I phoned back soon after to find out what was going on, and was told that the kettle was missing, along with the Earl Grey tea bags, the paracetamols, and some cushions. I said the place must have been burgled by a woman. 

The neighbour’s house on one side got burgled. The neighbour on the other side got ransacked, the warehouse got burgled, by people cutting through the roof. The cars along the street all got broken in to on one night. My scooter got nicked from by the garage, but a copper returned it the next day, said it had been dumped just down the road. Friends around the corner got burgled, the police said don't touch anything, they would be there in three days time. This all in a period of a year or two.  

Egg at Rannoch - don't leave eggs boiling in a pot on the stove - they exploded - going off like rifle shots and caking the kitchen windows, walls and ceiling in hard boiled egg. Took us all day to clean it all off.  

White Jacket 

I had the warning, the tall black guy, about 30'ish, on the underground, pissed off with the world, with a knife inside his jacket, itching to use it on someone. If I was not careful, on they way back to the flat I would be pushed into a dark doorway, a quick jab or two, and I would be done for, and he would never be traced to the crime.  

I was frazzled all day at County Hall, before catching the tube back to the flat, which meant transferring at one point, and waiting for the train to go. The black guy in the white jacket appeared, from down the platform, made his way up the train, and sat down just across from me.  

OK, thanks for the warning, would have to sit this one out, don't engage, keep calm, watch which station he gets off and do my best to avoid him. So rather freaked out now to make sure I didn't make a wrong move.  

Then the screaming started, from way down the platform. A black woman, quite young, professional looking, went off her trolly. It seemed a bozo of a white guy had said something about her going back to her own country, out of the blue. The lady had completely lost, screaming and in tears saying she had been born there and had every right to be there. She seemed close to a complete mental break-down.  

She was quite a distance away, but another black guy went over, physically picked her up and carried her - up the platform and into the carriage, and gently put her down, two seats to my right.  

The lady was still crying and moaning. The sort of situation that needs a bit of talking to and conversational diversion. But I was not getting involved in this one, The guy in the white jacket did not say a thing. Nor did he look at me. But the situation was now off the dial. The last thing he wanted to see a skinny white guy rabbiting on, trying to be helpful.  

So I sat, did nothing, remain as detached as possible. Which was a stupid way to deal with the woman, but it was out of my hands.  

The train soon came to my stop, and the black guy in the white jacket was also getting off, maybe I should have gone on to the next station, I don't know. But I got off, and had to take off in the opposite direction to where the flat was, as he went that way. I did a long circuit around and managed to get home alive. 

Go West. 

I go down to the headquarters of NZ's major building contractors to enquire about getting an actual career in NZ. The boss shows me his board on the wall with all the coloured pins on it signifying all their different projects that they had one the boil. They were all turning red as in the colour of projects being stalled or cancelled. He says nothing is going to be happening there for a long time and not to bother hanging around in the country and to head to Oz. His comments on the economy rapidly turn out to be correct as NZ and Asia are hit by the Asian economic meltdown of that time. Australia did not notice it. 

I had just finished my stupid higher education in Auckland, I am in the kitchen with the post, the first letter says I have achieved a piece of paper. The second letter says I owe heaps of money for it, my star sign in the paper says "Go now or forever miss the boat" and the music playing is the Pet Shop Boys version of "Go West." I get the point, pack up and leave three weeks later for Melbourne.  

There had been one job advertised in Auckland for architecture in two months. In Melbourne there were thirty on one day.  

Conversation Stopper 

A BBQ with pleasant people in Melbourne. I mention something about geo-political implications of a big country like Oz right and it close proximity to the broiling masses of Asia. One of the people there says "But Asia is not reality, the BBQ set in Melbourne was reality." This is the sort of conversation stopper that one hits fairly regularly over on the Mainland. 

Wrapped in Muslin 

He knows the guy is going to clean the garage. This weekend. But he has secrets, and quite a problem. And he has got away with it for so long. So it would be so easy for this guy not to bother with the garage, it does not need a clean out, its not his garage and he does not need to go to the effort. He could have made up an excuse, about how it was organized just have he wanted it. He could say anything really. He could stop this guy going in to the garage, poking around. Finding things that are going to cause a lot of problems. In an old sports type back up on the shelf, wrapped in muslin.  

If the guy going in to the garage and does start poking around, it is going to have repercussions for years. Especially for the himself, the garage owner. Everything will change. So why not tell they guy to mind his own business?  

But he does nothing. But frets and stresses a lot. But still does nothing. And the weekend comes along. So why keep the evidence so close, for so long. No one has questioned him. So one seems to even suspect. The evidence right there, close at hand, hardly hidden at all. 

And this guy does go into the garage and starts cleaning it out a bit, just to tidy up. And finds the bag. And inside, where she has been for how many years now. And now he has to face the murder charge.  

Long later. 

In his mind and his nightmares he relives the totally weird and ghastly episodes of experience, in a Europe occupied by evil in WW2.

As a very young boy, totally homeless and basically helpless, I can see some of it. The touch and go on whether they would send him to the camps. Straying around in the woods. The village and the other children in some kind of room being fed a good meal. 

The people in charge are not sure about him. But he gets away with it. The older guy looking at him in doubt, but deciding to take him at face value. And that after WW2 he never really told anyone about it, but it is a story that certainly should be told. Now its time to tell them and write it out of his mind in to a book. I see it about six months later, getting published.  And many years later being brought into question.

Verontsov - 1916 

I am writing out the settings for the home security cameras and hard drive. I get to the "General" settings before giving up for the night.  

Someone reports in frantically, from the Crimean Peninsular in 1916. It is evening, they are at the big house, the lady of the house is there, and revolutionaries have barged in, a full on house invasion. The lady is fraught and nervous, informs them that she will send for guards to turf the men out. Maybe she was going to phone. They are all in the main lounge room, she is at a desk, looking for the file . The file has "Verontsov" at the top. She seems to under-estimate the danger she is in. One of the thugs comes up behind her with a short rope and throttles her, throwing her across the desk. 

I do not know whether the thug killed here, she seemed a very slim, older woman, longish dark hair and imperious character. The other residents in the house, at least two of them, are horrified, They run out of the house, across the gardens into the trees, not knowing whether the revolutionaries will be following them to kill them too, but the thugs are more interested in stealing. The two people are both frantically saying they must get to "Ilya" and tell that person what has happened. They look behind and can't believe the house is still there, all lights on, and the lady, maybe dead in the livingroom or study or held captive by the thugs. 

It is such a fright I wake up and to get it out of my mind, write down Ilya Verontsov on the piece of paper, after the word "General." 

In the morning I look up Ilya Versontsov to see whether there was such a person, and find General Illarion Veronstov, who died in 1916 at his Crimean palace. It does not say he was murdered by the revolutionaries. If the two people are desperately going to see him at the Verontsov Palace in the Crimea then the latest it can be is 1916, and the political situation had not deteriorated so much, which may be why the lady under-estimated the danger she was in.  

Sandy Grave 

May 2023. 

I wake up with the dread again, this time it must be four years and no one has found the grave. That ghastly feeling of being involved with a death, and hiding the body, up the coast, into a bushy park, in soft sand between the dark trees, a beach side grave. It takes me a while on waking up  to disengage and realise it is again someone else's stressed out memories, their dreadful feeling every morning about a crime unresolved, but no one has linked this person to the crime. But I can not see a crime. Why was the guy dead on the sofa, in the living room, certainly not a pretty sight and the person has freaked out and not wanted to be associated with it all. Why not just call the police and get it dealt with, but something must have happened to make the person I link with want to hide the body, up north, up the coast, a right hand turn down a deserted road, sea on the east side, the right. A late night trip in a car, and shallow grave in the sand. To be dead on the sofa, is it and overdose of drugs? I can't see any blood.  

The epiphany, the age of Aquarius.  

The buzz, this is how you connect? Trip the light fantastic, Nirvana portal. But I can't find anything about it. This has happened several times when feeling fabulous, all is right in the world, a bit of alcohol and watching an amazing light and sound show, the buzz goes off, but its more than a buzz, Stardust vaporised. Full on connection to the national electrical grid, or perhaps "Beam me up Scotty" moment would be a better description. If it went on for longer I am not sure what would happen. I only get a quick ecstatic glittering starry blast of it, but am sure it would blow all my nervous system if it went on longer, although it seems fairly benign. The big outdoor concerts with the fireworks and music and sometimes the canon brought in for added sound effects. Ya!  

Smiling Assasins 

I am not sure what this guy is up to or who he mixes with. There is a rendezvour or meeting, public, outdoors. Not sure what happens but two guys afterwards start following him in a large car. He goes into a carpark, they follow, they get out of the car and are coming towards him, so not just co-incidental. They are youngish of middle eastern appearance. All friendly. This guy knows they are trouble and reacts straight away, fast. What ever he does sends the two guys scattering, running away.  

Later, in the night, he is at his place, in front of the computer in a home office. He has fallen asleep in the chair, in the dark, until late, but then thinks he ought to go to bed. In the house, dark. But then, there are more guys, in the dark, they have barged through the front door, a wide long passage. They can see him and know where he is. He can see them and the main guy, in the middle, coming towards him. Again, doing the 'happy to see you' act, but, so late at night, in the dark, breaking into the house. As if. My guy has a real fright, knows this is a serious situation - fast. The main guy is older, heavy set looking guy with dark short cruly hair, sort of greasy complexion. And he looks like trouble, and executioner. My guy does not have his gun on him, best thing to do would be to stop them know because later is too late.  - Such a fright I pull out of the situation and wake with a start. Not very nice. 3 July 2025 

Moth  

Yahweh, I am. The ancient concept from the Iron Age, the Hebrew name of god. The name revealed to Moses in the book of Exodus. "He brings in to existence whatever exists." or "I Am." Because the names don't stick.  

I am, I am moth. Never got around to getting a name.  

I am, because names are not written quite so indelibly in our minds, we are mainly "I, you, them." That's as far as it gets. The information does not seem to transfer down the centuries. So while experiences may be vivid, details like names are vague. 

Meanwhile, there is a large giggling cohort, or class. Maybe we were all the newly born and on our way. Climbing the precipitous huge cliff-face, of a tall shiny greenish curtain in the corner of a dark room, up to the open window. There were quite a few of us. Slowly making our way up. We see each other as human, talk and yell to each other and generally communicate what we consider to be normal, which is probably fairly minimal.  

The moth cohort get to the top of the curtain. The jump, the first flight, across the dark void from the curtains to the window sill, more of a wobbly jump and desperate scramble, but most of us make it.  

Some get in to Bhuddism in a big way, a religion founded in ancient times by a prince out slumming, but knowing he can always go back to the palace any time he likes. His philosophy is the rather cynical narrative on the beauty and transcendence of suffering, which is rather a negative concept, only a rich kid would come up with that knowing that if it comes to the crunch they can always check back in to the main hotel and have a good feed. The rich kid might have been better talking about 'stress,' which keeps us firmly engaged with the present time, and making the best use of it. 

The old local tradition was the Wairua, the two waters, joined during life but splitting at death with the tapu spirit being immortal. I am trying to find the Mauri, and where the memory is stored. At the end the, past the ominous presence, the slate is wiped clean. So where are the memories kept.  

My mother (2022) - "You always slept the sleep of death. Your brother could not wake you, shake you, and open your eyes but you would not wake up."  

All creatures of any species are born and brought up by their own species, and see each other as normal - and human, it is the Yahweh of all species, the paradigm. We see each other as normal and human, so do they. 

The moth cohort goes on. Others make it from the cliff like curtain to the window sill, the brief bit of first flight the only practise we get before launching off into the great outside, the huge darkening sapce, across a rusty corrugated iron roof, through the back garden to the dark trees further on.

Ends

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Ends.