Faithful, Departed

Back at you, Kray. Pics below, inspired by this.

I can’t get over how much I tend to miss things I never imagined I would. They creep up on you, those darn things. Sneaky buggers. An oft-repeated phrase, so comfortable and familiar with near-sickening overuse, a goofy gesture, kind, crinkly eyes, a maddeningly happy song, stale, yet unswervingly cheerful conversations, the silliest jokes that, in some inexplicable way, keep you going, the song, the tune, the lyrics that bring it all back, all rushing back, tearing at you with breakneck speed, relentlessly, painfully, urgently. The way you felt when you first heard it, the surprised, utterly open, naked smile that you broke into, the greed with which you soaked in every note, how silly it all felt, silly, and wonderful, and simple, and so strangely sad. You close your eyes, listen desperately, and drown in the memory.

-----

The tiny little that I saw of East Timor, flying away from the ship and toward Dili, was quite simply phenomenal. Actually, all of it was, not only the East Timor bit… the entire chopper ride was positively to die for. Really, absolutely to die for. It’s the most exhilarating feeling when, seemingly entirely out of the blue (um… absolutely no pun intended), you lurch away from the ship that you were surrounded by for five weeks. That first take-off kidnaps your breath as well – the initial gentle lift, followed almost immediately by the rapidly diminishing size of your mobile home in the sea, the undeniably impressive size of her ‘wedding train’ (heck, they’re even called ‘streamers’, those ten, deceptively innocuous-looking, six-kilometer-long cables of encased kerosene, digital electronics, and home to heaps and heaps of barnacles), the plunging blueness everywhere. And then there’s the flying-over-insanely-pretty-island-country thing that delivers the final blow. Makes you feel like you could never possibly tire of this, despite everything. Every little thing. Could it possibly, amazingly be a fair trade? Miles of indigo oceans, dazzlingly bright, white beaches, flying in a tiny, sputtering helicopter between soaring, lavishly vegetated hills (yes, between! Not ‘above’… ‘between’! Like… in Jurassic Park!), and straight into crazy, poofy, clouds, the whitest ones you’ll ever see. And then, in addition (like all this wasn’t enough!), the crazy little things that tickle you shocking pink. The way the million blades of grass next to the landing strip head-bang manically, utterly helpless against the commanding chopper blades. Flutterflutterflutterflutterbangbangbangbangflutterflutterbangka bangnodnodnodnod. Flutterflutterbangbang. The look of sheer amazement in the newbie’s eyes, a look, you realise, with a gasp, you’re dumbly, mutely wearing as well, the grin that escapes even the surliest faces of your chopper-mates as they take this all in, the general sense of equanimity and well-being and somehow-it-all-makes-sense-i-think-ness and oh-hell-I’m-so-madly-content-this-is-ridiculous-ness that fills your every pore. Even Bacchus couldn’t better this.

Not quite a fair trade, really. Five weeks of slave-labour for forty minutes of speechless bliss. I definitely don’t deserve forty.