Wot conscience?

I wonder if it's time for a re-definition of "conscience vote". A great deal is currently being made of the idea that the contentious issue of same-sex marriage should not be determined by "how the party decides" but rather according to the personal views of the elected members of parliament.

Conscience is a funny personal thing. I think mine works pretty well most of the time. I do think about what's the right thing to do, because it's not always immediately apparent in every circumstance. My dad was in Rotary many years ago, and I remember him talking about the 4-way test which that organization had adopted:

• Is it the truth?
• Is it fair to all concerned?
• Will it build goodwill and better friendships?
• Will it be beneficial to all concerned?

My Christian friends (and others) will be also very familiar with WWJD? (What would Jesus Do? - I'm also a big fan of "WWJCD" (What Would Johnny Cash Do?)

How about our elected members of parliament vote according to the views of their constituency, eh? How about following their conscience by really representing the people they were elected to represent? And, if they don't yet know what that those views are, then it's high time they got out into their electorates and found out. Cos, you know, that's kinda their job.

Or maybe, the conscience is about freedom. Not in an amoral, libertine sort of way, but a freedom to follow one's own mind (heart?) and to be loose from the shackles of an external framework which restricts one's true self from its expression. Of course, that could only happen when one actually has a good relationship with oneself.

And, obviously in the context of the of the same-sex marriage debate, the freedom for people to be true to themselves is a fairly primary matter.

Puzzled by climate change arguments? Me too.

Opinions are valuable things. But I think it's equally valuable to know when your opinion is supported by facts or not.

That's why the arguments around climate change continue to puzzle me. 

It puzzles me that when over 90% of climate change scientist are in agreement over the impact of human activity on the climate, the CC sceptics think they know more than the scientists. I'll bet if 9 out of 10 cancer specialists said the sceptics had cancer but it was treatable, they wouldn't be listening to the 10% who said there was no problem. They'd be moving heaven and earth to get going on their treatment (presuming they could afford it - lets not go there at the moment....)

A lawyer friend of mine always says "don't second guess your consultants" - sure, you might still get it wrong, but you could at least hope you'd gotten to your position through some expert means. It seems to me that most climate change sceptics/deniers got to their position simply because the other view is inconvenient. 

Further to this, our new (allegedly pro-market) government wants to lead the world as the first to repeal (arguably market based) CC legislation in favour of a non- market solution (which apparently no-one thinks will work). 

Puzzling indeed.

Bizarre family behaviours

I'd like to try getting into a discipline of sitting still long enough to write just for fun. Family life is just so, I dunno, full of family, that there hardly seems the time to luxuriate in the joy of seeing some words on the screen that no-one else has written before.

Oh sure, there are the endless nights of re-doing high school assignments with the kids - I think I'll do quite well in year 10 again this year - but those feeble attempts to straighten the syntax of an increasingly belligerent 14 year old who seems oblivious to the joy of a well crafted phrase, the chime of a nuanced metaphor and the basic courtesy of accurate spelling just don't carry the same satisfaction for me.

So it seems the small thing which happened at home is a nice place to rediscover the joy of some words.

Offspring #2 is studying film and TV at school and is in the middle of making a short (5 min) film. He has to write, storyboard, script, shoot, direct and edit this thing. I'm sure he could tell me there are several hundred other things he has to do as well (did you ever wonder what all those job titles in the closing credits of movies actually do? Does a "best boy" make really good sandwiches?)

Speaking of sandwiches, #2 has written a short story based on a real life experience he had as a "sandwich artist" (I'll leave you to guess which food franchise it was with), and pulled together a couple of mates, some equipment and gone off and filmed it- nearly.

The other night he and his friend (who was playing the character of the "sandwich artist") were in our lounge room shooting a few crucial seconds of the final part of the story.Picture it if you can- #2 with camera in hand, filming another kid who was pretending to be #2, walking through the lounge, uttering six words, opening the door to my bedroom (which itself was excelling in the role of #2's bedroom), and pretending to be going to sleep. The two of them shot this sequence SIX TIMES!!! (Maybe it was once for each word?)

All the while, the rest of us sat pinned to the walls, out of shot, barely allowed to breathe lest we spoil the audio.

It all felt strangely,well, ... normal. But wait, this had never happened before, and yet it was completely fine.

I believe the reason it was so comfortable, was that after years of #2 telling us that making movies and working in film was what he wanted to do with his life, he was honouring that intention, and us, by allowing us to witness him practicing his craft.It was another piece of family that I never expected, but enjoyed just the same.

It was truly an honour. And I hope to remind him of it at the opening of every film he ever makes.

Its been a long time...

..since I rock n rolled? Gee it sure feels like it. Sometimes life gets so busy with "stuff" that I forget what it's like just to do stuff. For me. Stuff that doesn't have a pay off.

I can remember when I was in my teens, and playing the guitar and singing seemed like just about the most important thing in the world. I had ideas about songs and music that just seemed to come out of me all the time, and I barely had enough time to write them down. Sitting on my bedroom floor when I probably should have been studying, it really truly didn't matter that I would probably never be any good at guitar-ing. Those were the days when you really could imagine anything.

35 years on and what have I got? A growing family, monster mortgage, a generally stimulating and satisfying job to do each day and 2 pretty nice guitars, sitting in their cases pretty much from one week to the next.

I used to be able to rattle off hundreds of songs, but now I have an alarmingly limited repertoire of hackneyed riffs and partly remembered lyrics. Funny how if you don't play 'em, you lose 'em. Where did those songs go?

More importantly, where did the singer go?

One for the Chardonnay/latte sippers.

Well, we sure do things convincingly here in Qld. The former government was bundled out of power a couple of weeks ago in an astonishing show of democratic will by the voters in the Sunshine State. After twenty years or so, the government led by Premier Anna Bligh (the first elected female premier in Austrlia, no less) discovered that they weren't universally loved, indeed, they were hardly loved at all, and it was time to go.

The statistics will now show that the new Liberal National Party is the most "mandated" government in Australia's history. That is to say, more people voted to have the LNP as their government than any other government in this wide brown land, than ever before.That is convincing, and good on 'em.

One of the LNP's key pre-election messages was about "reducing government waste", and that clearly rang some bells with voters. So now we're told that an early initiative to do that is the abolish the Qld Premiers Literary Awards programme, which will save the State approx. $230,000 (+ some change). All over the blogosphere and twitterverse (d'ya like those new fangled words kids?) the commentary has started. Well, here's some more.

The Awards seem to have started back in around 1999, under the Beattie Labor government, and have provided awards in a diverse range of areas to do with literature and writing. For those who can be bothered to think about it, here's the list of recently abolished categories:
  

·         Fiction Book Award

·         Emerging Queensland Author—Manuscript Award

·         Unpublished Indigenous Writer—Arts Queensland David Unaipon Award

·         Non-Fiction Book Award

·         History Book—Faculty of Arts, University of Queensland Award

·         Children's Book—Mary Ryan's Award

·         Young Adult Book Award

·         Science Writer Award

·         Poetry Collection—Arts Queensland Judith Wright Calanthe Award

·         Australian Short Story Collection—Arts Queensland Steele Rudd Award

·         Literary or Media Work Advancing Public Debate—The Harry Williams Award

·         Film Script—Screen Queensland Award

·         Television Script—QUT Creative Industries Award

·         Drama Script (Stage)—Griffith University Creative Writing Program Award , and

·         Encouragement and Development Prize

In the interests of disclosure, let me say, I quite like to read. Doesn't happen nearly often enough, you know, reading for reading's sake, but I do like it. And as I read back over that list, there's not one category which I would gladly remove from a programme of awards designed to nurture, encourage and develop new writing. Part of me would like to think that the new government felt just as torn when they decided to axe the programme.


Trouble is, I think its more likely that in the euphoria of an election victory, against the backdrop of "cutting costs", the LNP has fallen into the trap of taking the knife to one of the least offensive, and probably least likely to defend itself, sectors of the community. I reckon most people don't think about writers (or most artists generally) much at all, and those that do make it onto the public's radar are the blockbuster, best sellers, and surely they don't need support or encouraging anyway?


If the government (any government) is serious about improving our society, then communication, expression, storytelling, art and culture all have to be front of mind. Withdrawing funding from one of the important crucibles in which these things develop can't logically be a good way to do that. As (moderately successful) writer Nick Earls has already opined, the amount we're saving here wouldn't buy a new bus stop. I notice today that has also been announced that the government is reviewing the expenditure on corporate boxes at sporting events. It will be interesting to see how the people who will be affected by those cuts respond.


Could it be that this is seen as a way of showing that its not just the "yartz" which will  get its funding cut?  Doubt it.

Childhood Behaviour

I want, I want, I want. Thats what I hear from my kids, or at least, I used to. Now that they're getting older, its more like "I 'd really like to ...."

See, they're getting the hang of this life thing. They've started to understand the difference between the relentless instant gratification which characterises childhood and the more considered, self awareness and consciousness of others which adults are supposed to employ. And that s a good thing I think. It's even fun actually to do a kind of mental "before & after" photo in my mind to see how far they've come.

So when I have to deal with people who seem to wallow in the "me, me, me" and "I want.." of childhood (& childish) behaviour, I like to imagine they're like my kids in the "before" photo.

Hopefully, I may live long enough to also see them in the "after" shots as well. But, for some, I doubt it. Its as if these kids just never grow up.

Now, what do I do with them?  In a work environment, should it be possible to say "you know what? This just isn't working for me. I'm not your parent, and I don't care to deal with this childish nonsense any longer."

Or, do we say, as the scriptures could suggest, "I forgive you 70 times 7 for the appalling tantrums you throw". Or, maybe its like the Fair Work Act and say "Final Warning, next black letter breach you're out!" (And what if its only a "grey letter" breach? )

Where's my role as an employer in helping a kid (no matter what age they are) to grow up?

Geez Solomon, where are you when we need you?

No, don't thank me.... no, really...( an essay/rant)

Sometimes I just don't get it. People, I mean. You think you've got them sorted out in your mind, you inderstand where they're coming from, and wham! - they leave you guessing again.

For the last few years (nearly 3, in fact) we've been looking after a couple of dogs for a friend. Well, she was the friend of a friend actually. She'd decided to accept a job in beautiful downtown Dubai, where the air is hot, the women are covered up, and you can (reputedly) make a great deal of money compared to here. So, I don't blame anyone who is capable of taking such a position from wanting to get on in life.

Anyway, this "friend" had a couple of dogs, (her "babies" she called them) and not much else to stop her from having a go at a Dubai stint. One thing led to another and we suddenly had two small dogs to look after, supposedly for 6 months.  No biggie.

Of course, that was until (not long after she'd gone) we got the email to say she'd accepted a longer contract and would probably be back in a year, maybe. (did I mention that she left the country (& her "babies") without offering to pay for any of their costs? we eventually asked for and received a regular payment of $25 per week to defray the fur-ball's costs - considering most kennels charge that much PER DAY PER DOG, I reckon she was doing OK.)

So, I'd pretty much resigned myself to the fact that we were now the "owners" of these mutts; certainly the dog pound to which they were taken every time they houdini'd their way out of our backyard and which smilingly charged me $65 "bail" to release them thought of me as their owner.

Suddenly, mid last year, we got a message that she was coming home, her contract was not being renewed. "She couldn't wait to get back to her "babies", she missed them so much!" (oh puhhlease)

And, on Christmas Eve, good to her promise, she arrived to collect them. She seemed surprised that the dogs didn't leap into her arms in recognition, but I put that down to the relatively small brains which small dogs have (logical really) and that their memories were too full of important things like, "how to get out of backyards","when to eat" and "when to bark for food (yep, 4am)".

We said our (no so tearful) goodbyes and I was happy to call it quits at that point.  Until last week.

Out of the blue, I got a phone call from the dog pound, with a polite lady telling me that one of the dogs had been found by an very caring person on the other side of town, and could I ring her to arrange to collect him? I had to convince her that despite my regular attendance at her facility to retreive said mutt, I was not in fact his owner, that she was back from OS, and I would be happy to put them in touch. (oh & could I be taken off their database please?)

So, I rang the lady who had found the dog, thanked her for her kindness, and assured her I'd get the real owner to contact her ASAP. I then spent the next HOUR trying to track the recently-returned-from-Dubai-owner down, leaving 2 voice messages for her to call me back. Eventually I sent her a text SMS with the phone number of the rescuer and hoped the message was getting through somehow.

Without any responses at all, I called the good samaritan who found the dog to update her, whereupon she told me that the owner had just left her place with the dog, thanks very much.

I'm writing this a week later & I still haven't heard from the owner.

Like I said, sometimes I just don't get it. Maybe I should get another dog - they're easier to understand.